Something for Calum (sorry all): "One day
later I had word from Derek Colby to tell me that the original was written
in 1994 by the
Swansea poet Nigel Jenkins who, like so many Welsh people,
had enjoyed watching then Welsh secretary John Redwood singing the anthem
on TV 'like a pixillated carp'. He sent it to the Welsh office as a sort of
favour, and heard no more about it until he read how Ffion, then a civil
servant, had deployed it to train her man.
The full version, entitled:
'Some Words for English Viceroys, Rugby Players
and Others, in Abuser-Friendly English, To Help Them Con Televiewers That
They Can Sing the Welsh National Anthem' appears in Mr Jenkins's book of
poems,
Ambush (Gomer Press, Llandysul). It is slightly different from
Ffion's version (and infinitely better than my bodged attempt last week).
As a poem in its own right, it has a splendid Edward Lear feel:
My hen laid a haddock, one hand oiled a flea,
Glad farts and centurions threw dogs in the sea
I could stew a hare here and brandish Dan's flan,
Don's ruddy bog's blocked up with sand.
Dad! Dad! Why don't you oil Auntie Glad?
Can't whores appear in beer bottle pies?
O butter the hens as they fly!
Other readers have offered other versions, and it's amazing how different
they are. Take the last line: 'Better henny-eyed, bar-high'(Will Parker);
'Oh boy, my dear hen is so high'(Valerie Lewis), 'Oh bother it, hen he hath
bar high'(Michael and Katherine Lewis, Valerie's husband and daughter) and
from David Lloyd of Bushey, what sounds like a despairing surrender: 'Oh,
buddy, please find me a bar!'"
and the Danish ?
Hugh W
