Taliesin
Earliest poet of the Welsh language whose work has survived.
Whence come night and flood?
How they disappear?
Whither flies night from day;
And how is it not seen?
Ruler of heaven, Ruler of every people!
We knew not, O Christ! that it was thou.
If we had known thee,
Christ, we should have refrained from thee.
I have come to salvage Elphin's honor and his freedom. Taliesin am I, primary chief bard to Elphin.
Primary chief poet
Am I to Elphin.
And my native country
Is the place of the Summer Stars.
John the Divine
Called me Merlin,
But all future kings
Shall call me Taliesin.
Elphin of noble generosity,
Do not sorrow at your catch.
Though I am weak on the floor of my basket,
There are wonders on my tongue.
Which was first, is it darkness, is it light?
Or Adam, when he existed, on what day was he created?
Or under the earth’s surface, what the foundation?
He who is a legionary will receive no instruction.
Songs and minstrels.
And the hymns of angels,
Will raise from the graves,
They will entreat from the beginning.
They will entreat together publicly,
On so great a destiny.
Those whom the sea has destroyed
Will make a great shout,
At the time when cometh
He, that will separate them.
And what is pleasant to me is no worse.
And the paternal horn by mead-nourished payment.
Pleasant, the directing of fish in the pond;
Also pleasant, calling about to play.
To my deprivation, to my sorrow, sinew was brave.
The world would not be if not for my offspring.
I am a bard to be praised. The unskilful
May he be possessed by the ravens and eagle and bird of wrath.
When the trees were enchanted,
In the expectation of not being trees,
The trees uttered their voices
From strings of harmony,
The disputes ceased.
Let us cut short heavy days,
A female restrained the din.
She came forth altogether lovely.
The head of the line, the head was a female.
The advantage of a sleepless cow
Would not make us give way.
The blood of men up to our thighs,
The greatest of importunate mental exertions
Sported in the world.
And one has ended
From considering the deluge,
And Christ crucified
And the day of judgement near at hand.
Who was confessor
To the gracious Son of Mary?
What was the most beneficial measure
Which Adam accomplished?
Meditating were my thoughts
On the vain poetry of the bards of Brython.
Making the best of themselves in the chief convention.
Enough, the care of the smith’s sledge-hammer.
I am in want of a stick, straitened in song,
The fold of the bards, who knows it not?
Pleasant, the eagle on the shore of the sea when it flows;
Also pleasant, sea-gulls playing.
Pleasant, a horse with gold-enamelled trappings;
Also pleasant to be honest in a breach.
Ye have committed wickedness
Against the Creator.
A hundred thousand angels
Are to me witnesses,
Who came to conduct me
After my hanging,
When hanging cruelly,
Myself to deliver me
In heaven there was trembling
When I had been hung.
When I cried out Eli!
I was nine full months
In the womb of Ceridwen.
Before that I was Gwion,
But now I am Taliesin.
Do not the brave know
The greatness of their progeny?
A country present will meet thee,
And while it may possibly be yours,
Three hundred thousand years save one,
A short hour of the day of everlasting life.
Although I am small, I am skilful.
From the sea and the mountain,
From the river's depth
God gives His gifts to the blessed.
I was patriarch
To Elijah and Elijah.
I was there at the crucifixion
Of the merciful Mabon.
A pleasant virtue, extreme penance to an extreme course;
Also pleasant, when God is delivering me.
Pleasant, the carousal that hinders not mental exertion;
Also pleasant, to drink together about horns.
I have been a sow, I have been a buck,
I have been a sage, I have been a snout,
I have been a horn, I have been a wild sow,
I have been a shout in battle.
I have been a torrent on the slope,
I have been a wave on the extended shore.
I have been the light sprinkling of a deluge,
I have been a cat with a speckled head on three trees.
I have been a circumference, I have been a head.
A goat on an elder-tree.
I have been a crane well filled, a sight to behold.
Very ardent the animals of Morial,
They kept a good stock.
Of what is below the air, say the hateful men,
Too many do not live, of those that know me.
While I was held prisoner, sweet inspiration educated me
and laws were imparted to me in a speech which had no words...