A parishioner has shared In Llantrithyd Church by the Welsh poet A.G. Prys-Jones (1888 to 1987), first published in History on my Doorstep (1959). The poem remembers the Aubreys, Lords of the Manor four hundred years ago, who lie buried between the nave and the altar. It follows them through the seasons of the Vale, their christenings, marriages and funerals, and imagines the crumbled manor house whispering to the grey church walls each spring and autumn.
Here lie the Aubreys, Lords of the manor
Four hundred years ago :
They, too, saw Easter come to Glamorgan
in apple blossom snow.
They saw high summer’s radiance,
and gentle autumn’s glow :
and here they heard the torrent winds
Of winter come and go :
But now they all lie sleeping
Between nave and altar
In their long, prescriptive row.
Only the church and the crumbled manor
Remember the Aubreys
Four hundred years ago :
These saw them come to christenings,
and marriage and Mass
In the Vale’s bright beauty :
And these saw them pass
All, solemn and slow,
To their last resting-places
Beyond the green grass,
In the church
Between nave and altar.
But when, in the bounty of spring
Tall daffodils blow,
And again when the lamps of the fall
In the woodlands show, and the vespers ring
So, surely, then the crumbled manor stirs
And whispers low
To the grey church walls
Tell all the sleeping Aubreys
There below
How constantly each gracious season calls
with its gifts of rich blossom,
Warmth, colour, swift snow,
In the Vale they loved so tenderly
So long ago.
A.G. Prys-Jones 1888-1987
Published in History on My Doorstep, 1959