Waldo Williams Gwlad Beirdd

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-# Above the snow, the sky is red

-# All of Swansea is ablaze

-# I walk home in the night #

-I felt now that we were living...

-..by killing and devouring.

-It was endemic within us,

-and a poison to us all.

-It was an overwhelming feeling.

-I suffered from it...

-..for many, many months.

-# Children of God #

-It's hard to put

-your finger on it...

-..but Waldo's words

-somehow draw us in.

-He seems familiar to us

-because he's so earnest.

-You're right, and his poems

-reveal his need for peace.

-Not just peace for himself...

-..but peace for the whole world.

-He believes that people

-are inherently good.

-We excel when we help each other.

-Ultimately, he recognizes it.

-This community of kindness

-is what will prevail.

-The day will come

-when the small will stand tall.

-For me, one of his haunting lines

-is his reply to this question.

-What is it to live?

-He states that it is "to possess

-a great hall within a cell."

-I remember hearing the story

-behind those words.

-Waldo was cycling

-around Pembrokeshire, as usual.

-He came upon a man

-cutting grass outside a chapel.

-He dismounted

-and went over to speak to him.

-He said to him,

-"What a little chapel you have."

-Clearly, the man took umbrage.

-"It may be small from the outside,

-but it's big inside!"

-Waldo understood.

-To possess

-a great hall within a cell.

-I still remember Waldo

-from the night I first met him.

-I was coming home from school,

-after playing rugby.

-I was on the bus when a man boarded

-and sat by me.

-I knew who he was,

-having seen photos of him.

-I was sitting, lost for words,

-next to this very important man.

-I wanted to say something

-intelligent and sophisticated.

-A bubble car, made of glass,

-one of those round cars, passed us.

-I said, "Waldo, what's your view

-of these bubble cars?"

-No answer. Silence for two minutes.

-After two minutes, he said...

-.."a bubble

-for all the world's people".

-Another anecdote concerns

-the writing of the poem Cofio.

-He was staying with his friend

-Willie Jenkins here at Hoplass farm.

-The sun was close to setting

-in the west.

-We were cutting turnips

-when I started it.

-He wrote the first verse and then...

-We went in for supper,

-and the rest came very quickly.

-Waldo himself

-didn't rate Cofio highly...

-..but it has won a place

-in the nation's consciousness.

-It's so enchanting. It sings.

-And yet, a tinge of terror

-pervades some of the lines.

-Think of his reference

-to "little words of lost languages".

-No-one rolls them

-on their tongues any more.

-As for the ending, Waldo's question

-is hopefully rhetorical.

-He believes in his heart

-that someone, somewhere...

-..the perpetual DNA maybe,

-does remember everything.

-One fleeting minute

-before the sun goes down

-One gentle minute

-before night comes on to reign.

-To remember the unremembered things

-Lost now in the dust

-of time gone by.

-Like the foam

-that breaks on lonely beaches

-Like the song of the wind

-where no one hears.

-I know they're vainly calling to us

-Those unremembered things

-of humankind.

-The skill and achievements

-of those early people

-In small abodes and in great halls

-The artful tales lost over centuries

-The gods not known to any now.

-And the little words

-of lost languages

-Happy on the lips of men were they

-And sweet on the ear

-in children's chatter

-But no-one rolls them

-on their tongues by now.

-Oh, untold generations of the world

-With their dreams divine

-and fragile divinity.

-Is silence all that remains

-for those hearts

-That once rejoiced and knew despair?

-Often, as dusk draws in

-and I'm alone

-A yearning comes

-to know you every one

-Is there one left

-whose heart and mind recalls

-Those old forgotten things

-of humankind?

-It's so strange

-to think of him cutting turnips...

-..when Cofio just came to him.

-He often speaks

-of poems coming to him.

-Energy awakens the imagination.

-As for lines which puzzle

-the listener, he says this.

-He has put switches in the poems

-to illuminate the meaning.

-Those seeking clarity

-need only touch one of them.

-Through your power,

-let me be for your sake, a poet.

-There are clever people.

-There are intelligent people.

-There are poets

-who are masters with words.

-It all flows very beautifully.

-And yet the greatness

-of someone pure in heart...

-..is head and shoulders

-above their greatness.

-Blessed are the pure in heart,

-for they shall see God.

-Waldo was such a person.

-His purity of heart

-gave him a special vision of life.

-There's more than just poetry here.

-When the pure of heart speak,

-they speak the truth.

-It's a truth

-that's worth listening to.

-One of Waldo's most famous poems

-is Mewn Dau Gae.

-In it, he describes an extraordinary

-vision he had as a young boy.

-The experience stayed with him

-throughout his life.

-Imagine the 14-year-old Waldo

-standing between these two fields.

-He realizes that the people

-of the world are all related.

-More so, the fact that we're

-all brothers and sisters...

-..is our very purpose.

-But who decides that purpose?

-That's what he's questioning.

-"Who? Who was the marksman?

-The sudden expositor?"

-Yes, but there was no-one else

-in the field when he had his vision.

-It must have been

-an extraordinary medium...

-.."rolling the sea of light"...

-..and making him visualize

-these fields full of people.

-Waldo's father

-was a primary school headmaster.

-He was born in the schoolhouse

-at Prendergast, Haverfordwest.

-As a seven-year-old,

-the monoglot English speaker...

-..moved to the heart

-of the Preseli...

-..to Mynachlog-ddu,

-where everyone spoke Welsh.

-He said that he had

-a lifelong struggle with mutations.

-It's a strange thing.

-I was quite slow...

-..in writing Welsh prose.

-The mutations bothered me.

-I had that uncertainty with prose.

-They didn't when I wrote poetry.

-Rhos Aeron, Llandissilio

-was an important place for Waldo.

-This is where

-his great grandparents lived.

-I have very fond memories

-of visiting Auntie Gladys.

-Gladys Llewellyn was headmistress

-of Clunderwen primary school.

-Rhos Aeron was her home,

-and I'd stay there in the week.

-I'd go home at weekends.

-I got to know Waldo,

-who often called by.

-The house overlooks

-Weun Parc y Blawd and Parc y Blawd.

-They feature in the poem

-Mewn Dau Gae.

-Young Linda Llewellyn

-came to this house on holiday.

-She was from the Rhondda.

-In 1941, she became Waldo's wife.

-The couple set up home

-in Botwnnog on the Lleyn Peninsula.

-Waldo was a schoolmaster there.

-She was my nest, my heaven,

-my refuge in my two homes.

-My muse, for a while, she made...

-..a little bird

-above earthbound thorns.

-Within two years of their marriage,

-Linda died.

-Her loss was a body blow for Waldo.

-It wasn't the first time

-that he had lost a loved one.

-Morfydd, his sister, died

-when she was only 12 years old.

-Waldo had no children of his own,

-but he was a friend to the young.

-His style of teaching

-was most unconventional.

-Inventive and imaginative,

-he could enter a child's world.

-He had the ability to do that.

-He often played games.

-Sometimes, he brought a wigwam

-into the class.

-To enter the wigwam,

-children had to speak Welsh.

-He was a brilliant teacher,

-quite brilliant in that sense.

-He was kind and loving.

-What more can you give a child?

-Waldo certainly gave them his love.

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-Following the death

-of his wife Linda in 1943...

-..Waldo moved to England.

-It's as if he wished to escape.

-It was all so painful for him.

-He worked on farms in Wiltshire.

-He visited the museum at Avebury.

-It's a prehistoric site

-near Marlborough.

-Waldo was shaken on seeing

-a young child's skeletal remains.

-This brought back memories

-of his sister Morfydd.

-From this experience

-sprang the poem Geneth Ifanc.

-Yes, it's a sad poem,

-but it's also full of hope.

-Waldo sees that our world today...

-..is a richer place

-because of Avebury's young girl...

-..and of children through the ages,

-including his sister Morfydd.

-"A bluer blue because of her."

-The stone skeleton was a young girl.

-Each time anew she holds me.

-A century for each year of my age

-I travel back to reach her world.

-Her people dwelt in peace

-Earning the earth's help

-with their skill.

-Pondering the secrets

-of birth and marriage and death

-Keeping the bonds

-of the family of man.

-They placed her early

-in her eternal crouch.

-Twelve times she welcomed in May

-Then the dark reaper caught her

-Her voice was no more

-in the mountain.

-The wide, wide sky was deeper there

-A bluer blue because of her.

-More certain

-the unseen house and eternal

-Because of her on these heights.

-Although Avebury is in England,

-the link with Wales is important.

-The same people lived here

-as in Stonehenge and the Preseli.

-They were a peaceful people.

-In Waldo's words, they earned

-"the earth's help with their skill."

-These people treated the land

-with respect, not greed.

-The same idea is found

-in the poem Preseli.

-He talks of parents who "reached

-and gave the children the sun."

-They passed on the best things

-in life to the next generation.

-From their toil, they reached

-and gave the children the sun.

-Life's journey is painful.

-Our feet are blistered

-from walking over life's embers.

-That is Waldo's appeal -

-he writes about suffering...

-..and about overcoming

-that suffering.

-That's why his appeal is so great.

-"The day will come

-when the small will stand tall."

-The downtrodden will rise.

-In his poem

-Daw'r Wennol Yn Ol I'w Nyth...

-..these are Waldo's words.

-"To their school, war came

-To tear up the field of Crug y Mel."

-This is his subject -

-Castlemartin, Pembrokeshire.

-The soldiers

-have been here since the 1930s.

-The army had a plan

-for a training base in the Preseli.

-But the locals rallied,

-in Waldo's words...

-.."To keep the wall

-from the monster...

-.."To keep the well free of dirt."

-Words alone weren't enough for him.

-Waldo was a Quaker

-and a committed pacifist.

-He protested

-against the Korean War.

-He refused to pay income tax.

-In 1960 and 1961,

-because of that, he went to prison.

-# Above the snow, the sky is red #

-It was shame I felt -

-guilt, personal guilt.

-It depressed me considerably.

-At times, I almost

-couldn't go out in the street.

-I decided to make this stand.

-# My father and mother

-are on my mind #

-I felt that poems were no good.

-Something had to be done.

-I felt powerless.

-# Peacemakers, peacemakers

-# Children of God #

-He enjoyed prison,

-and the comradeship...

-..among those who were in prison.

-He was pleased

-to have been given a gardening job.

-He was outside,

-working in the gardens.

-All I remember about him in jail

-was this one story.

-Hairy Tom, a mechanic,

-was in jail with Waldo.

-They were sewing mailbags.

-A bell would ring at lunchtime.

-Waldo and Tom were always together.

-When the bell rang, Tom would say

-"Hey, boy, it's playtime."

-Memories of the school bell.

-If Cofio begins

-with "one fleeting minute"...

-..another poem deals

-with a smaller unit, the moment.

-It's about the instant

-when everything stands still.

-It's when we, just sometimes...

-..have the privilege

-of seeing unusual things...

-..and hearing unusual things.

-Once again, he sets our brief time

-on earth in the context of eternity.

-There is no talk of the moment

-in any scholar's book

-The river's flow ceases

-and the rock shouts

-That it's a witness

-to things not seen by eye

-Nor heard by ear.

-A breeze between breezes

-Sun from beyond the sun

-The wonder of our true haunts

-Not twisted, nor eroded

-Filling the world.

-We know since the Moment comes

-That we are born for the Hour.

-He's an all-time great.

-The only pity

-is that he didn't live longer.

-He could have told us more.

-He could have written more too.

-But such is life.

-A man in the pit of blood.

-He was a man

-with a heart full of compassion...

-..for the suffering millions.

-He was a man who knew pain and pity.

-He wrote these victorious songs.

-There's nothing superficial here.

-They come from the heart.

-Because it's from the heart,

-it arouses a response within us.

-That's why Waldo

-is Wales's favourite poet.

-He's Wales's greatest poet.

-Don't you think that this stone

-in this tranquil place...

-..is a fitting memorial for Waldo?

-Yes, and I hope that all of us

-who travel along that road...

-..take time to stop and look around.

-We should appreciate what we have.

-In this area,

-Waldo had a close-knit community.

-He saw a pattern of recognition.

-This sustained him

-in his dark periods.

-This type of recognition

-would not permit war between men.

-The essence of this fraternal

-feeling in a society...

-..is the testament

-that there is something within us...

-..which is outside of this world.

-That's why we exist.

-It's part of our purpose.

-Heaven.

-One day, brotherhood

-will unite the families of Earth.

-S4C Subtitles by Adnod Cyf.

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