An Ode on the Death of Hoel by Aneurin

Had I but the torrent’s might
With headlong rage, and wild affright
Upon Deïra’s squadrons hurl’d
To rush and sweep them from the world!
Too, too secure in youthful pride
By them my friend, my Hoel, dy’d
Great Cian’s son; of Madoc old
He ask’d no heaps of hoarded gold;
Alone in Nature’s wealth array’d
He asked and had the lovely maid
To Cattraeth’s vale, in glitt’ring row
Twice two hundred warriors go;
Ev’ry warrior’s manly neck
Chains of regal honour deck
Wreath’d in many a golden link:
From the golden cup they drink
Nectar that the bees produce
Or the grape’s ecstatic juice
Flush’d with mirth and hope they burn
But none from Cattraeth’s vale return
Save Aeron brave and Conan strong
(Bursting through the bloody throng,)
And I, the meanest of them all
That live to weep and sing their fall