Elegy for Ifor and Nest
Awkward old age and longing and pain
and tribulation like an arrow head,
Ifor is dead, no excellence [anymore],
4 and Nest is dead, Wales is worse.
It is worse for [want of] a foster father, a narrow door
at the front of the chancel separates me from him;
Nest is dead, my music is a sea,
8 maiden of heaven; true Ifor is dead.
Straight-bodied Ifor was the best man (our king
putting the English on biers)
of all who were, beloved one of [his] lineage,
12 all who are and all who ever will be.
I will never go from my sanctuary because of a sense of loss to
his minstrel
who travelled around the world;
my arms do not play [the harp] at all,
16 I will not get, I'll not possess an easy life.
Easy life causes heart's grief
and longing in this breast and old age.
Because of showers of tears, prodigious blue wash,
20 for Ifor and Nest, the streams are ever increasing.
The good Lord inflicts upon me a harsh affliction of the
eyesight,
Nest the treasure is not to be seen, evil word.
Wave of sadness or overflowing of pain,
24 lovely hue of summer's radiance, foam of torrents,
on seeing the charity of saintly love for benefit
and a beloved one, wise patronage,
fine white Nest, knowledgeable about wine, white her teeth, and
Ifor,
28 they gave me gifts to excess.
They nurtured me with sparkling wine from a glass at feasts,
and then they forsook mead from drinking horns,
and they would give me red gold and jewels every hour,
32 they were like great hawks.
The two had long talents, seldom would they skulk away
in hiding together or avoid company,
and they are as one person who would never keep me waiting for
benefit,
36 and they were one prosperity for benefit.
A fortress-destroying leader in war, not feebly did they
perform
nine thousand adventures in tournaments.
In the fair court of Basaleg they bore a salutation,
40 and the lady of its fine floor, a place of great
inebriation,
where there is speech, a constant flow of wine vessels
and a bright cupbearer and slenderness of brows.
Blade-hacker who scattered Englishmen in the splendid manner of
anointed Llyr,
44 and ravaging lion in battle, many his honours,
maintainer of a host of prosperous kinsmen, beloved by all in
his land;
may the Lord of heaven guide his old age there.