Translations into English Verse from the Poems of Davyth ap Gwilym/The Snow Image

by Dafydd ap Gwilym

THE SNOW IMAGE.

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The bard, in going on a visit to Morvyth, tumbles over an image of snow.

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Woe to the bard who feels the hate
So oft—of unpropitious fate!
Last night as from the inn I came^[1]
To her who wears the clear moon’s flame,
In thought exulting—and beguiled
By spirits boisterous and wild—
O’er savage hills I took my way,
Amid the wintry tempest’s fray;
The snow came pelting fierce and fast,
Hurled in thick vollies by the blast;
Drifts lined the mountains and the rocks—
And every bower had frosty locks!
The blinded bard, amid those bowers,
Laughed not, I ween—as in Spring’s hours!
As vexed and goaded on by fear,
I hurried thus in full career,
I marked not that the landscape’s hue
At every step still whiter grew!

I marked not from afar the site
Where lurked that most unhallowed wight,
Taught by the pangs, with which I groan,
Since then the wretch too well I’ve known,
By his base treach’ry tripp’d and thrown!
By his unwieldy form of snow
Roughly arrested in my track,
Onward, like arrow from a bow,
I sprung—then fell, and broke my back!
Detested form! that—like the trunk
Of aged tree—the bard o’erthrew;
How like thou art in form and hue
To an old miser—or a monk^[2],
A miser, and his bags of gold!
Woe to the miscreant who rolled
Thy figure from the snow, to be
A fence for “Hunchback” against me;
A fence to Hunchback, caitiff rude,
A plague to all the neighbourhood!
Thou loaf-shaped heap—thou rustic fort,
To break my legs—ill mannered sport!
Meal-coloured castle—snow-white pump,
Reared (where none need thee) on the hill;
Thou frigid post—thou frosty stump,
Ah, thou hast wrought me grievous ill!
And wrung with thy untimely blows
Blood from my feet and from my nose!

Thou rugged heap, thou cumbrous mass,
That wilt not let a stranger pass;
Like a bear’s skull—may the sun’s light
Melt and disperse thy wintry height,
And break thy snowy forts—and may
The gallows tree the wretch repay,
The man of infamy and guilt,
Who thy untoward turrets built!
Ah, fatal haste! that made me break
My nose for beauteous Morvyth’s sake!

1. Tafarn Gwin, ‘the tavern of wine.’

2. ‘How like thou art in form and hue
   To an old miser—or a monk.’

   This is one of the poet’s sneers at the religious orders of his time. In another poem, addressed to the Owl, he compares that bird to ‘an old abbess.’