The dark years

Mostly Wales is cold, dark mysterious and devistatingly beautiful. It's a lonely barren wilderness. I was lost for many hears, heartbroken, not caring, not feeling, not living.
Oh gentle winds 'neath moonlit skies,
Do not you hear my heartfelt cries?
Below the branches, here about,
Do not you sense my fear and doubt?
Side glistening rivers, sparkling streams,
Do not you hear my woeful screams?
Upon the meadows, touched with dew,
Do not you see my hearts a'skew?
Beneath the thousand twinkling stars,
Do not you feel my jagged scars?
Seek not my mournful heart kind breeze,
For you'll not find it 'mongst these trees.
It's scattered 'cross the moonlit skies,
Accompanied by heartfelt sighs.
It's drifting o're the gentle rain,
A symbol of my silent pain.
It's buried 'neath the meadow fair,
Conjoined with all the sorrow there.
It's lost among the stars this night,
Too far to ease my quiet fright.
No gentle winds, seek not my heart,
For simply ... it has torn apart.

My family cared for me as if I were a baby, but I was wild and had a very hard time coming to terms with my "new" self. Iolo and Shân loved me as if I were their own child. Barely 18, the girl I knew before locked inside my broken heart. I was cold, unfeeling. How could he have done this to me? I heard that he was living in India, I had to face him and rip out his heart like he had mine.

I loved my "new" family dearly, but I was eaten by desire to avenge my "change". I travelled to him, following whispers on the breeze. I went alone, to Mumbai, never stopping once. It was 1964, the world was changing around me. I embraced the change but was thirsty for revenge. I found him in the Royal Palace, but watched and waited as he courtisaned many a lovely dancer. More than anything I needed to know what I meant to him if anything.

That night I murdered for the last time. It was a necessity, the Lady in Question was an arrogant snob who had access to a ball at the palace held by the maharishi. I stumbled around in her wardrobe and found my first item of coture, a sequined Mary Quant dress in deep burgundy, which accentuated my waist length blonde hair and pale skin.

I was beautiful.

In a moment of doubt in front of the mirror I asked myself what I was doing so far away from home, on my own, was he worth it? I perused for a long time, not moving, not daring to look away from the girl woman in the mirror. My God, look at what I had become.

I lost track of time there deep within my own self doubt. I lost myself completely allowing the dark to encompass me. No heartbeat to count, no warmth.

I ran, all the way to the dance, in shoes so large they swallowed my feet. I did not care I had to get some answers.

When he saw me he knew why I had come. He stared at me with his death dark beautiful eyes and took my hand, and silently led me to the dancefloor. I felt so weak against him, so feeble. But this had to end.

"Well now child" he whispered to me, softly sweetly just as I remembered in those fuzzy memories

"just as perfect as I remember!" He laughed then and I think it was the laugh that tipped me over the edge.

"How dare you" I sang him his favourite oh fortuna, and in that moment I served my justice, his body only dancing it's macabre dance. I had taken his head in my hands. I ran with it and threw it into the flames of the fireplace. I can still hear the screams today. I had no answers, my heart was still in tatters, but I had my revenge. It made me no happier this way, but it has made me the wary, lonely figure you see today. A square peg in a round hole, never quite adapting to the vegetarian way of life.

I am a child of Wales, dark, changing, perhaps even aloof and proud. But I have time on my side and my heart must mend.

"becoming"

This is my story, I'm not sad things turned out this way.

Flowers for a grave,Both dainty and distressing,
As tears escape twin rivers of the soul.
Convenient time I gave,Infrequently expressing,
The sentiment between routine and role.
Words left unspoken,Considered unnecessary,
Sunshine and shadows, petals and tears.
Now the bridge is broken,The chance was temporary,
To cross back and stroll through tender years.
Eulogies and regret,As mysterious as Jade,
I failed to say just what I really meant.
A cemetery debt,For love that went unpaid,
And greeting cards I never even sent.


I was born to a poor welsh family in the poorest of times. Turn of the Century meant that all men were occupied in the slate mines for hours on end whilst women worked labouriously bringing the home to perfection. Boys as young as six went to the quarries, and girls at ten or eleven were turned out to serve in the larger towns.


In this time of "dim Cymraeg" or the Welsh not all people were taught in English if education was given at all. This was my fate.

As a child my father although harsh in manner made me sing. I sang my heart out. In churches, in eisteddfods, in school (for what little time I had there), hoping that one day I would be whisked away to a life which would allow me to sing for ever.

At ten I was as the youngest daughter sent to work for lord Snowdon in the then up and coming town of Caernarfon. I left my family for the first time with a great fear in my heart.

I worked for the first three years as the lowest of the low, a scullery maid. I cleaned out the fireplaces in the morning, washed the hearths, beat the carpets, dusted. Then it was washing smalls, starching shirts, only stopping at ten in the evening for food (leftovers from the main meal) and a shared single bed.

During the first War we never saw the master of the house. I used to skulk in doorways listening and learning the beautiful songs sung by our Lady and her daughters at the Piano Forte. I promised that I would escape my existence and sing again.

At thirteen I became a serving assistant. Meaning that my day now begun at five instead of four, and I was to learn to serve breakfast and meals to the gentry.

At the end of the War our Master came home. He was pallid and week and spent most of the days in his bed. Some said he had Diptheria, some say he had the cholera from serving in India. I kept my opinions to myself as I knew not what he was like before he left. Time passed, we left trays for him at the door, they remained uneaten. Lady Snowdon and her daughters went to London for the season leaving the Master in his bed.

I was 14 when he first laid eyes on me. It was quiet without the mistresses in the house and I had taken to playing and singing at the piano myself. I had never been disturbed before. That morning, as I sung the first few lines of a familiar tune he was just there as if from thin air. I was so embarrassed I jumped for my life. He just smiled at me and told me I was to see him again and sing for him in the morning. He was a beautiful man, black hair, pale skin, very refined. Of course I was flattered. I was barely a woman, childlike and unlearned.

During the next four years he tutored me so, let me sing for his guests and let me fall in love with him, like a puppy dog, he taught me everything. One thing only he neglected to mention was his lust for my blood. As the Lady Snowdon divorced him, I thought perhaps I may become his new choice. What a fool I was! On the day I could afford to leave for University, he found my plan and begged me to stay. I would have for the world if he married me. He laughed at the thought and became a monster. I would not yeild my body to him, but he took it regardless. Leaving me for dead, he had his "men" leave me in the wilderness.

I'm not sure how long I lay still for, dead, dying I could not care less. I would never sing again. I was wracked with burning pain, but numb and plummeted knowingly hoping for death. When it did not come I rebelled..........

I killed feverently because of hunger. No one could guess that this small blonde girlwoman could have such a voracious appetite. I murdered and burned, and became lonely and numb. I wondered how many years without direction, howling for a saviour.

One came in the shape of Iolo my "father", he took me to his mate Shân who had to spend years attempting to tame the ferile side of my nature. I had become like our landscape, hard and unielding. I was taught that I could heal, and perhaps love again.