While my own mouth shall bless Thee
And my Saviour confess Thee.
Hail, glorious Lord!





MY BURIAL

(After Dafydd ab Gwilym, the most famous Welsh lyrical poet, 1340-1400)


When I die, O, bury me
Within the free young wild wood;
Little birches, o'er me bent,
Lamenting as my child would!
Let my surplice-shroud be spun
Of sparkling summer clover;
While the great and stately treen
Their rich rood-screen hang over!
For my bier-cloth blossomed may
Outlay on eight green willows!
Sea-gulls white to bear my pall
Take flight from all the billows.
Summer's cloister be my church
Of soft leaf-searching whispers,
From whose mossed bench the nightingale
To all the vale chants vespers!
Mellow-toned, the brake amid,