Night Song of Dafydd ap Gwilym

All this I was doing Over a girl, In loneliness going Across the bare moor And through the blind night In the pitch of the darkness, Lost from the high road.

Through many ridged fields, Down slopes that were soggy, Over stubble and furrow With stumble and sorrow, Through nine thorny thickets, By ruined old forts, To the brow of the mountain,

And missing the bogs And their green habitation Whose hateful companions Circled around me, A fighter betrayed In the thick of the battle, A man in a gaol.

But worse than the fogs And all desolation Were the spirits of evil Circling around me, And my crossing and praying, My charming and rhyme Of little avail.

This took a long time: But at last I looked up And there were the stars! Like cherries they were In the orchards of night, All yellow and red, All shining and bright.

The sparks of the bonfires Of seven dear saints, The gems of the host In the harness of heaven, The pickets of embers Whose orbits are long And wind cannot take them.

I stopped in my tracks, And "Look you," I said, "This is over and done. She will have to be told, God forgive me the telling, I'll travel no more To the door of her dwelling Through any such going Nor blunt my good axe On the face of the stone."