59 quotes
Fair Elphin, dry your cheeks!
Such sorrow does not become you,
Although you consider yourself cheated
Excessive sorrow gains nothing,
Nor will doubting God's miracles.
O God, the God of formation,
Ruler, strengthener of blood.
Christ Jesus, that guards.
Princes loud-proclaiming go their course
For a decaying acquisition.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
Book-learning scarcely tells me
Of severe afflictions after death-bed;
And such as have heard my bardic books
They shall obtain the region of heaven, the best of all abodes.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
Pleasant to bring back the divisions of a parish;
Also pleasant to us the time of paradise.
Pleasant, the moon, a luminary in the heavens;
Also pleasant where there is a good rememberer.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
Dominus virtutum
Has gathered together those that were in slavery,
And before I existed He had perceived me.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
Elphin of noble generosity,
Do not sorrow at your catch.
Though I am weak on the floor of my basket,
There are wonders on my tongue.
While I was held prisoner, sweet inspiration educated me
and laws were imparted to me in a speech which had no words...
A hallowed grave in dying, with the grave an altar:
I adore the sovereign lord, the great,
That I be not sad, Christ grant me.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
Pleasant, liquors of the mead-brewer to the multitude;
Also pleasant, a songster generous, amiable.
Pleasant, the open field to cuckoos and the nightingale;
Also pleasant when the weather is serene.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
John the Divine
Called me Merlin,
But all future kings
Shall call me Taliesin.
I have fled in the shape of a raven of prophetic speech,
in the shape of a satirizing fox,
in the shape of a sure swift,
in the shape of a squirrel vainly hiding.
Ruler of heaven, Ruler of every people!
We knew not, O Christ! that it was thou.
If we had known thee,
Christ, we should have refrained from thee.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
I was nine full months
In the womb of Ceridwen.
Before that I was Gwion,
But now I am Taliesin.
I have sat in the perilous seat
Above Caer sidi.
I shall continue to revolve
Between the three elements.
There was a calling on the Creator,
Upon Christ for causes,
Until when the Eternal
Should deliver those whom he had made.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
When the trees were enchanted,
In the expectation of not being trees,
The trees uttered their voices
From strings of harmony,
The disputes ceased.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
I have been a sow, I have been a buck,
I have been a sage, I have been a snout,
I have been a horn, I have been a wild sow,
I have been a shout in battle.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
In manliness he will greet my trouble,
Should I be bled, I should evidently get better;
Truly I saw no one before, who saw not in me
Every indisposition, he will cultivate his business.
Book of Taliesin (1275)
It is a fit time to go to the drinking,
With the skilful men, about art,
And a hundred knots, the custom of the country,
The shepherd of the districts, support of gates,
Like going without a foot to battle.
Book of Taliesin (1275)