Poetry Mine

by: Jones, Geoff

published: Caneri Press 

binding: paperback

price: £6.00

ISBN: 9780956192103

The following is from the author's web site.

Visiting and revisiting people and places (Nantyglo, Y Fenni, Crickhowell, Ebbw Vale and The Eisteddfod) generates ideas for numerous poems and unexpected surprises:

…nerves twanging away
like Welsh longbows at Crécy
arrows parried by the work ethic…

Mam

For bi-lingual Welsh speakers Nantyglo, the first poem in the collection is written in English and Welsh. The invasion of English speaking workers into my own county of Monmouthshire during the Industrial Revolution virtually wiped out the Welsh language in that area of South Wales:

Of course, the experience of climbing the mountains of the Welsh valleys especially The Milfraen and Mynydd-carn-y-cefn, either side of my childhood village and those of the Vale of Usk such as The Sugar Loaf or Pen-y-fal, Blorenge and both the Skirrids encirlcing Abergavenny is inspirational to a poet seeking new themes.

…our own language dug up and cast aside on rubbish tips of profit
so we were left with scraps of words quickly devoured
before starvation led us to a forced diet of foreign words…