The Girls of Llanbadarn

Dafydd curses the women of his parish, lamenting his lack of success with them. He ponders what flaw exists in him or them that none will meet him in the woods. Comparing himself to Garwÿ, he admits to always being in love with some girl but never winning her heart. He confesses that every Sunday, he sits in church, turning his head away from the congregation to stare at some girl. Dafydd imagines such a woman gossiping about his appearance and character with her friends. The poet ultimately concludes that he must abandon these pursuits and live as a hermit, since despite his persistent ogling, he remains without a girl. ==Commentary==

Dafydd often refers to Llanbadarn in his poems, reflecting the fact that he was born at Brogynin, in the parish of Llanbadarn Fawr, and lived there for many years. He shows his knowledge of Welsh legend with his reference to Garwy Hir, who was renowned as a lover, and whose daughter, Indeg, was herself loved by King Arthur. The line in which the poet is said to be "Pale and with his sister's hair" are consistent with a third-hand description of Dafydd given in a 16th-century document: "tall and slender, with long curly yellow hair, full of silver clasps and rings". It has been suggested that the first of Dafydd's two disparagers is the woman whom in many other poems he calls Morfudd, the object of his often rejected devotion. ==Theme and analogues==

The poem's theme, Dafydd's habitual failure in love, is a very common one in his work. As the novelist and scholar Gwyn Jones wrote: No lover in any language, and certainly no poet, has confessed to missing the mark more often than Dafydd ap Gwilym. Uncooperative husbands, quick-triggered alarms, crones and walls, strong locks, floods and fogs and bogs and dogs are for ever interposing themselves between him and golden-haired Morfudd, black-browed Dyddgu, or Gwen the infinitely fair. But a great trier, even in church. Parallels to Dafydd's amused and ironic reportage of his own inadequacies can be found in Chaucer's works, and elsewhere in medieval literature; also in the poems of Dafydd's avowed model Ovid. But Dafydd is also, more seriously, pointing up the superficiality of the girls' criticism of his appearance as compared with an implied judgement of his true worth. ==Poetic art==

In common with other Middle Welsh poems of the form called cywyddau "The Girls of Llanbadarn" follows complex rules of construction. It uses the system of alliteration and internal rhyme known as cynghanedd, except in the lines recording the comments of the two girls, where, in contrast with the rest of the poem, the diction is plain and conversational. Sangiad, the breaking-up of the syntactical structure of the sentence, is used in most of the poem. The scholar Joseph Clancy illustrated this with a literal translation of the last lines, in which the second half of each line interrupts the narrative flow with the poet's commentary on it: From too much looking, strange lesson,Backwards, sight of weakness,It happened to me, strong song's friend,To bow my head without one companion. == Influence ==

The 20th-century Welsh poet Raymond Garlick wrote a poem, "Llanbadarn Etc.", inspired by "The Girls of Llanbadarn" and addressed to a contemporary who, though displaying behaviour similar to that depicted in Dafydd ap Gwilym's poem, has no words now to crown it withor turn it to a cywydd. ==English translations and paraphrases==

• Bell, H. Idris, in With the Middle Welsh original in parallel text. • With the Middle Welsh original in parallel text. • With the Middle Welsh original in parallel text. • • Rev. repr. in his • • Edwards, Huw Meirion. At With the Middle Welsh original. • • • • • • Humphries, Rolfe. • Repr. in his • • • • • Rev repr. in • • Rev. repr. in With the Middle Welsh original in parallel text. • • • • • • • ==Notes==