News Archive

Gillian’s poem on Gwent Archive’s new site

Extracts of a bilingual sonnet composed by the National Poet of Wales, Gillian Clarke, has been placed upon a giant wall on part of the new Gwent Archive site in Ebbw Vale. Gwen Archive was established in 1938 as the Monmouthshire Record Office, serving the ‘old’ county of that name. The new site for the Archive was opened on 24 October, 2011, and it has around 10km of state of the art storage.

Here is Gillian's sonnet in full:

Archive

We left our mark on pages, stones,
between Usk and Wye, Ebbw, Monnow, bones
in the turned earth of a field, in pit and street,
lists and litanies, letters, wills, receipts,
the etcetera of terraces, a statued square,
traces of who we were.

Ysgrifen yr afonydd, sibrwd Sirhywi,
Rhymni, Wysg, Gwy ac Ebwy,
geiriau o gariad, stôr o straeon,
gwaith glo, gwaith haearn,
gwaith tir mewn gwynt a glaw,
deilen a dalen yn yr adeilad hwn.

Archive of echoes, strata of history
stored in these walls, our story.

 


For more information about the National Poet of Wales, click here, or contact Literature Wales on 029 2047 2266 / post@literaturewales.org