A POEM BY MENNA ELFYN

As a preview for our upcoming December issue, and to support our campaign beginning November 1st to support children in Gaza, we offer this poem in Welsh and English by the poet Menna Elfyn.

Eto fyth yn Gaza*

Wedi pob cwymp— eli
i gusanu’r clwyf yn well,
yna’r brith-len ysgafn
ei wead, yn sidanu,
anwesu’r croen:
cyfrinach wen wedyn
dan blaster glân.
*
Fel plant byddem
yn brolio ein briwiau,
‘wedi bod yn y wars’,
fydde sylw’r rhai hŷn,
y darn sgwâr fel tarian—
a’r gwaed yn dyst distaw.
*
Mor ffwrdd-â- hi yw
codymau pitw plentyn.
Heno, wrth wylio’r byd
heb fandej, dirwymyn
yw’r ddinas sy ar ei gliniau
yn y tawch ac awch angau’n
parhau, heb rwyllen na llen.
Ac yn Gaza, heb gysur ydynt,
y genedl hon sy’n geni
a marw, heb na salm na balm
na bendith – ond y rhai â’u croesau
yn dragwyddol bob ennyd awr
’yn y wars’.

*Bu Gaza un amser yn nyddu deunydd lled-dryloyw – gauze (ghazza-Arabeg).

Gauze in Gaza*

After a graze, balm
to kiss the wound better,
then a square of gauze
its light, silky weave
caressing skin,
a white secret
hidden under plaster.
*
As a child,
we’d brandish this shield—
‘been in the wars’ again
the elders sighed,
blood, our quiet witness
after a sudden fall.
*
Tonight, how light-hearted
the talk of slips as we once
hit the dirt headlong—
while we watch on screen
folk and tribes unbandaged,
a land without torniquet,
and still no gauze in sight in Gaza,
only the thin woven fabric
of a nation eternally
‘in the wars’.

*Once a centre for weaving, the thin translucent fabric and its open weave – gauze.

---

Menna Elfyn is an award winning Welsh poet and playwright with
fifteen collections of poetry, children’s novels, libretti for UK and US composers,
stage, television and radio plays. Murmur (Bloodaxe Books), was a PBS
Recommended Translation, Bondo (Bloodaxe Books) was published in 2017, and
a Welsh language volume Tosturi (Mercy) (Barddas) in 2022. Translated into
twenty languages, she is Professor Emerita, University of Wales Trinity Saint
David.