Although the subject may seem unpredictable, the collection A470: Poems for the Road / Cerddi’r Ffordd, has proved popular with critics and readers and has already been reprinted twice since it was launched on St David’s Day in March. Sian Northey, who co-edited the volume, thought of asking people to write – in Welsh or English – a poem about the road, which stretches 186 miles from Cardiff in the south to Llandudno in the north, crossing towns, villages , mountains and valleys. The selected poems were translated and printed side by side in both languages. Hundreds of people sent contributions – about a third in Welsh – to publisher Arachne Press and 51 were selected. Northey said the A470 was a good topic because most Welsh people had some kind of opinion – good or bad – about the road. “People who travel it regularly tend to curse it, while those who use it less frequently have fonder feelings,” he said. Her own poem, Rhyw Bedair Awr (About Four Hours), suggests that the road – with “all the twists / the occasional red kite” – transforms the traveler into another person. Northey said it was important the book was bilingual. “There is a tendency for the literary scene in Wales to be divided between the Welsh language or English. It’s nice when they can come together.” Editors and publishers were delighted by the variety of poems. There are many descriptions of mountains and rivers, references to the seashore, slate quarries, birds of prey and fighter jet stones. One poem recalls how children used to beat the Welsh with the headmaster’s cane. Tributes are paid to a boarded-up little chef in Builth Wells, the Llandudno goats who took over during the first lockdown and – in one called Llawlyfr Mam i Pit Stops Cymru (Mam’s Guide to Welsh Pit Stops) – the best places to take a break toilet. Stephen Payne, poet and academic, submitted a poem for the museum in Pontypridd, just yards down the road. For him the road means trips to the Brecon Beacons and the Hay festival, a sense of escape. He said it traveled through “remarkably unspoiled” country, connecting north and south in a way that the arduous journey of the railway could not. “It’s a good image for the unity of Wales,” he said. Fittingly, the volume has gone viral, with poets reading their work up and down the country, including at the famous National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth. Storyville Books in Pontypridd held a reading of some of the poems, where Jeff Baxter, co-owner of the shop, said they had clearly caught the imagination. “The event was great fun, with some emotional weight evident and a real flow between the poets and the audience, especially moving naturally between English and Welsh, the two languages of Wales. “Everyone who has lived on the route has such strong memories and emotions attached to the road. If you live near the valleys section of South Wales, for example, you can hear the road in the background almost constantly, always present. For me personally it means I’m almost home when I turn off the M4 at the A470.”
