IDRIS DAVIES

Consider Famous Men

Consider famous men, Dai bach, consider famous men,

All their slogans, all their deeds,

And follow the funerals to the grave.

Consider the charlatans, the shepherds of the sheep!

Consider the grease upon the tongue, the hunger of the purse!

Consider the fury of the easy words,

The vulgarity behind the brass,

The dirty hands that shook the air, that stained the sky!

Yet some there were who lived for you,

Who lay to die remembering you.

Mabon was your champion once upon a time

And his portrait's on the milk-jug yet.

The world has bred no champions for a long time now,

Except the boxing, tennis, golf, and fascist kind,

And the kind that democracy breeds and feeds for Harringay,

And perhaps the world has grown too bitter or too wise

To breed a prophet or a poet ever again.