Stirring stuff, that’s poetry and porridge (From South Wales Argus)

Stirring stuff, that’s poetry and porridge

10:23am Friday 14th July 2006

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GLYNFAB John is one of the rarest of poets one who manages to make some money from his muse.

"I write about anything and everything, including sex, which is an important part of life," says the 83-year-old former Gwent headmaster, with an impish smile.

Glynfab was born at Wattsville, in the lower Sirhowy Valley, and went to Pontywaun Grammar. His youth was spent wandering the surrounding hills, where he began to gain a reputation as something of an oddbod.

"I walked the hills alone, hardly ever seeing anyone from the village. It was looking out over the Severn Estuary and in the other direction away up into the mountains that poetic thoughts came.

"I was the eldest of six and had attention lavished on me until the others came along. I loved going into Newport, which seemed like a Mecca, with tram rides to Belle Vue Park and visits to the market and the four picture houses.

"But I couldn't wait to get back to the Valleys, which were my real inspiration."

All through the war Glynfab worked in accounts in what is now Alcan, at Rogerstone, all the time honing his craft.

"Straight after the war I trained as a teacher at Caerleon and afterwards worked in Bristol before getting a teaching job at Wattsville Secondary Modern."

By this time he was married to Dora, with whom he has two sons, Gareth and Glyn. Dr Gareth John is a well-known writer on Gwent topics.

"Things began to take off for me in 1953, in which year I had five poems included in Risca Poems, published by the Starling Press of Risca.

"In 1956 I joined Gwent Poetry Society, which met in the library in Dock Street, Newport, before moving to the Dolman, where the actor Basil Rathbone's wife, Sybil, was a central figure.

"We used to get talks from the likes of Laurie Lee, of Cider With Rosie fame.

"Every year the society came out with an anthology and I'd always have a couple of poems included."

As his pen ranged over subjects from love and nature to jealousy and introspection, Glynfab came to the attention of Don Touhig, MP for Islwyn and formerly under secretary of state for defence, and at that time editor of the Free Press of Monmouthshire.

Mr Touhig, who has remained an admirer of Glynfab's work, recalls: "After the publication of a few of his lighter musings I saw the idea was so popular that I started to publish Gwent Poets' Corner.

"Over the following years I was to publish some 65 of Glynfab's poems."

In recent years, and assisted by Gareth, who has acted as his father's agent, Glynfab has been contributing poems to the mass-circulation The Fireside Book and the Friendship Book, published by D C Thompson. His poem Christmas is for Children has been put to music by the composer Harry Bayley.

Due to his frailty he is largely confined to a residential home in Newport where his wife, Dora, is also a resident, but the pen of this ebullient poet is not stilled.

"When the ideas come I put them down and work them up into a poem. I consider myself a free spirit. There are no areas into which I will not venture," he chuckles.

"It's all out there for the writing."

The title of his latest work, Poetry and Porridge, was suggested by Glynfab's son, Gareth who said poetry is nourishment for the soul.

* Poetry and Porridge by Glynfab John is published by Old Bakehouse Publications (01495 216222) at £9.95.

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