Pontypridd © J C Milne

This poem was written many years ago, so please forgive it any poetical failings! Bridges are so important.
I was going to add a photograph, but am never sure about copyright, and instead decided to include a reference to a picture by Dave Lewis, also from Pontypridd. Dave is a Goodreads author and the poem below was submitted last year to an annual competition he runs.
http://www.david-lewis.co.uk/wp-conte...

Pontypridd © J C Milne

Old Bridge; a child’s first peek at ages past,
a blindly savoured cherry to be sucked;
dear growing, then, by this old town, though
floods dismembered banks, stones, roads,
my Auntie Blod’s piano naked in the street;
and same old floods, in eons gone, swept
through our arch of soil, our lovely bow,
and rushed it down the Taff that raced below.
And when I learned a wooden bridge was raised,
in my head its splinters flew, the river sang:

My cup runs fast, and roaring through.
I joyouse on, while all these faces watch,
Who for my splendid show have laboured long,
Have cut and bent and joined their little bridge,
And watched it go, ripped in my surgent flow.

Then in the wake of chaos flowed new arch of stone,
hollowed out to take the flood, and bless the vision
And the toil. This stone stood firm, shoulders now
New Bridge, offspring of the rib. Similarly stand,
Beside New Town with all its modern sheen,
Evan and his brother James, statued near,
Monuments for lovely Wales. Say with pride,
Ynysangharad, Pontypridd. In the saying, still
Slips the flood of ages through this sweet
Land of our fathers, hen wlad fy nadau,
Old in the blood, the birthplace of our song;
And ever, on land or stream, the foot and span.