Ty Mawr Wybrant 

(William Morgan’s birthplace)

You carry the emptied acorn cup like an offering,

one palm steadying the other,

keeping it raised, level with your nose;

studying it with giantwide eyes

as though the vacant chrysalis still cherishes life

and you might witness its spell.

Your mother convinces you

to let it snuggle up in your pocket,

so you can think tiredfeet over the doorframe

and measure your path across the flagged floor.

Drovers once gathered in this dark room,

all bullish in their noise, butting up to the hearth.

The warden strokes your head like a halo,

tells you the tinybed consumed six sitting sleepers

and shows why the windows were thinned of glass.

He coaxes your mischief, chases you around the bibles,

plays hide and seek in all of William Morgan’s tongues

and lets you slide down sheer steps as we leave.

When you roar a smiling goodbye at him,

he rewards you with a chocolate egg –

undiscovered treasure from last Sunday’s hunt –

and you cup it in your hand,

this hollowshell, as you’d done the half acorn,

when the house was still so big to you.

Wales Arts Review described Glyn Edwards as one of the ‘most exciting young voices in Welsh poetry’. His first collection will be published in late 2018 by The Lonely Press. He is an editor of Cheval, the anthology of the Terry Hetherington Prize, and The Tishman Review. He is a teacher in North Wales. 

© Glyn Edwards, 2018. Image © Jo Mazelis, 2018.