'Senni' by Aeron Davies

They fought fierce and hard
to keep the old valley from the water.
The blood of the inhabitants was roused
And everyone stood together as one.
They saw no reason to yield the land
As a sacrifice to the god of some Englishman;
To lose the old land, our inheritance,
Why suffer the results of such violence for ever?

Society and meadow would have disappeared -
The home the chapel and Church and
Welsh culture at its best –
But they wouldn’t make a second Epynt of the place….
To the Brychgoed farmyard one morning
Came the board and their bold machinery
Thus far and no further was the watchword and
John had a siren in the house.

The valley was saved from the dam
And peace came back to its heart.
It was better than that watery stillness
To see flocks on the hills and the meadows
Some people mentioned the compensation
they would have received if they had gone away.

No compensation can pay
for home, neighbourhood, society, and friends.


Translated from the original in Welsh by Jen Cairns, April 2005. Reproduced with acknowledgements to Cerddi Powys - Dafydd Morgan Lewis [Golygydd] and Gomer Press 2004

Note: This poem is about the planned flooding of the upper Senni Valley to make a reservoir. Local and National opposition in 1971 & 1972 prevented from happening.