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From YouTube: A Child's Christmas in Wales
Description
In this video, Michael from Bournemouth library read's Dylan Thomas', A Child's Christmas in Wales.
A
A
child's
christmas
in
wales
by
dylan
thomas
one
christmas
was
so
much
like
another
in
those
years
around
the
sea
town
corner
now
and
out
of
all
sound
except
the
distance.
Speaking
of
the
voices,
I
sometimes
hear
a
moment
before
sleep
that
I
can
never
remember
whether
it
snowed
for
six
days
and
six
nights
when
I
was
12
or
whether
it
snowed
for
12
days
and
12
nights.
A
When
I
was
six
all
the
christmases
rolled
down
toward
the
two-ton
sea
like
a
cold
and
headlong
moon,
bundling
down
the
sky,
that
was
our
street
and
they
stop
at
the
rim
of
the
ice-edged
fish
freezing
waves,
and
I
plunge
my
hands
in
the
snow
and
bring
out
whatever
I
can
find
in
goes
my
hand
into
that.
Wool.
White
bell-tonned,
ball
of
holidays
resting
at
the
rim
of
the
carol
singing
sea
and
out
come
mrs
prothero
and
the
firemen.
A
It
was
on
the
afternoon
of
christmas
eve,
and
I
was
in
mrs
prothero's
garden
waiting
for
cats
with
her
son
jim.
It
was
snowing.
It
was
always
snowing
at
christmas
december
in
my
memory
is
white.
As
lapland,
though,
there
were
no
reindeers,
but
there
were
cats,
patient,
cold
and
callous
our
hands
wrapped
in
socks.
A
We
waited
to
snowball
the
cats
sleek
and
long
as
jaguars
and
horrible
whiskered,
spitting
and
snarling.
They
would
slink
and
sidle
over
the
white
back
garden
walls
and
the
links
eyed,
hunters,
jim
and
I
fur
capped
and
moccasined
trappers
from
hudson
bay
off
mumbles
road
would
hurl
our
deadly
snowballs
at
the
green
of
their
eyes.
A
But
soon
the
voice
grew
louder.
Fire
cried
mrs
prothero,
and
she
beat
the
dinner
gone
and
we
ran
down
the
garden
with
snowballs
in
our
arms
toward
the
house,
and
smoke
indeed
was
pouring
out
of
the
dining
room
and
the
gong
was
bombalating
and
mrs
prodero
was
announcing
ruin
like
a
town
crier
in
pompeii.
A
This
was
better
than
all
the
cats
in
wales
standing
on
the
wall
in
a
row
bounded
into
the
house
laden
with
snowballs
and
stopped
at
the
open
door
of
the
smoke-filled
room.
Something
was
burning
all
right.
Perhaps
it
was
mr
prothero
who
always
slept
there
after
midday
dinner
with
a
newspaper
over
his
face,
but
he
was
standing
in
the
middle
of
the
room.
Saying
a
fine
christmas
and
smacking
at
the
slope
smoke
with
a
slipper
call.
The
fire
brigade
cried
mrs
brother,
oh
as
she
beat
the
gong,
they
won't
be.
A
A
Nobody
could
have
had
a
noisier
christmas
eve
and
when
the
firemen
turned
off
the
hose
and
was
standing
in
the
wet
smokey
room,
jim's
aunt,
miss
protoro
came
downstairs
and
peered
in
at
them
jim,
and
I
waited
very
quietly
to
hear
what
she
would
say
to
them.
She
always
said
the
right
thing.
Always
she
looked
at
the
three
tall
firemen
and
their
shining
helmets,
standing
on
the
smoke
and
cinders
and
dissolving
snowballs,
and
she
said.
A
When
we
rode
the
daft
and
happy
hills,
bareback,
it
snowed
and
it
snowed.
But
here
a
small
boy
says
it
snowed.
Last
year
too,
I
made
a
snowman
and
my
brother
knocked
it
down,
and
I
knocked
my
brother
down
and
then
we
had
tea,
but
that
was
not
the
same
snow.
I
say
our
snow
was
not
only
shaken
from
white,
wash
buckets
down
the
sky,
it
came
shawling
out
of
the
ground
and
swam
and
drifted
out
of
the
arms
and
hands
and
bodies
of
the
trees.
A
Snow
grew
overnight
on
the
roofs
of
houses
like
a
pure
and
grandfather
moss.
My
neatly
ivy
the
walls
and
settled
on
the
postman,
opening
the
gate
like
a
dumb
numb
thunderstorm
of
white
torn
christmas
cards
where
their
postman
then
too,
with
sprinkling
eyes
and
wind
cherried
noses
on
spread
frozen
feet.
They
crunched
up
to
the
doors
and
mittened
on
them.
Manfully
that
all
the
children
could
hear
was
a
ring
of
bells.
A
A
They
were
just
ordinary
postmen,
fond
of
walking
and
dogs
and
christmas
and
the
snow
they
knocked
on
the
door
with
blue
knuckles.
Ours
has
got
a
black
knocker
and
then
they
stood
on
the
white.
Welcome
mat
in
the
little
drifted
porches
and
huffed
and
puffed
making
ghosts
with
their
breath
and
jogged
from
foot
to
foot
like
small
boys
wanting
to
get
out
and
then
the
presents.
A
Then
the
presents
after
the
christmas
box
and
the
cold
postman
with
a
rose
on
his
button
nose
tingled
down
the
tea
tree,
slithered
run
at
the
chilly
glinting
hill.
He
went
in
his
icebound
boots
like
a
man
on
fishmonger
slabs.
He
wagged
his
bag
like
a
frozen
camel's.
Hump
dizzily
turned
the
corner
on
one
foot
and
by
god
he
was
gone.
A
Get
back
to
the
presents.
There
were
the
useful
presents,
engulfing
mufflers
of
the
old
coach
days
and
mittens
made
for
giant
sloths
zebra
scarves
of
a
substance
like
silky
gum
that
could
be
tug
awards
down
to
the
galoshes,
blinding
tamashantas,
like
patchwork
tea,
cozies
and
bunny,
suited
busbees
and
balaclavas
for
victims
of
hedge
shrinking
tribes,
from
aunts
who
always
wore
wool.
Next
to
the
skin.
A
Who
wants
to
be
a
cow
and
a
painting
book
in
which
I
could
make
the
grass
the
trees,
the
sea
and
the
animals
any
color.
I
pleased
and
still
the
dazzling
blue
sheep
are
grazing
in
the
red
field
under
the
rainbow
building
p,
green
birds,
hard-boiled
toffee
fudge
and
all
sorts
crunches,
crackles,
humbugs,
marzipan
and
butter
welsh
for
the
welsh
and
troops
of
bright
tin
soldiers
who,
if
they
could
not
fight,
could
always
run
and
snakes
and
families
and
happy
ladders
and
easy
hobby
games
for
little
engineers
complete
with
instructions.
A
A
You
put
one
in
your
mouth
and
you
stood
at
the
corner
of
the
street
and
you
waited
for
hours
in
vain
for
an
old
lady
to
scold
you
for
smoking,
a
cigarette
and
then
with
a
smirk,
you
ate
it,
and
then
it
was
breakfast
under
the
balloons
with
their
uncles,
like
in
our
house.
There
are
always
uncles
at
christmas,
the
same
on
pools
and
on
christmas
morning
with
dog,
disturbing
whistle
and
sugar.
A
I
would
scour
the
swatched
town
for
news
of
the
little
world
and
find
always
dead
bird
by
the
post
office
or
by
the
white.
Deserted
swings,
perhaps
a
robin
all,
but
one
of
his
fires
out
men
and
women
wading
or
scooping
back
from
chapel
with
tap
room
noses
and
wind
bust
cheeks.
All
albinos
huddles,
their
stiff
black
jarring
feathers
against
the
irreligious
snow
mistletoe
hung
from
the
gas
brackets
in
all
the
front
parlors.
A
A
A
Sometimes,
two
hail
young
men
with
big
pipes,
blazing
no
overcoats
and
wind-blown
scarves
would
trudge
unspeaking
down
to
the
frozen
sea
to
work
up
an
appetite
to
blow
away
the
fumes
who
knows
to
walk
into
the
waves
until
nothing
of
them
was
left.
But
the
two
furling
smoke
clouds
of
their
inextinguishable
briars.
A
When
out
of
a
side,
clogged
side
lane,
then
I
would
be
slap
dashing
home.
The
gravy
smell
of
the
dinners
of
others,
the
bird
smell,
the
brandy,
the
pudding
and
mints
coiling
up
to
my
nostrils
when
out
of
a
snow
clogged
side
lane
would
come
a
boy,
the
spit
of
myself,
with
a
pink
tipped
cigarette
and
the
violet
cast
of
a
black
eye
cocky
as
a
ball
fringe
leering
all
to
himself.
A
I
hated
him
on
sight
and
sound
and
would
be
about
to
put
my
dog
whistle
to
my
lips
and
blow
him
off
the
face
of
christmas.
When
suddenly,
he
with
a
violent
wink,
put
his
whistle
to
his
lips
and
blew
so
stridently
so
high,
so
exquisitely
loud
that
gobbling
faces
their
cheeks
bulged
with
goose
would
press
against
their
tinseled
windows
the
whole
length
of
the
white
echoing
street
for
dinner.
A
A
I
bet
people
will
think
there's
been
hippos.
What
would
you
do
if
you
saw
a
hippo
coming
down
our
street?
I
would
go
like
this
bam.
I'd
throw
him
over
the
railings
and
roll
him
down
the
hill
and
then
I'd
tickle
him
under
the
air
and
he'd
wag
his
tail.
What
would
you
do
if
you
saw
two
hippos
iron
flanked
and
bellowing?
He
hippos
clanked
and
battered
through
the
scudding
snow
towards
us
as
we
passed
mr
daniels
house,
let's
post
mr
daniels,
a
snowball
through
his
letterbox.
Let's
write
things
in
the
snow.
A
Let's
write,
mr
daniels
looks
like
a
spaniel
all
over
his
lawn
or
we
walked
on
the
white
shore.
Can
the
fishes
see
it
snowing
the
silent
one?
Clouded
heavens
drifted
onto
the
sea?
Now
we
were
snow,
blind,
travelers
lost
on
the
north
hills
and
vast
dewlapped
dogs
with
flasks,
around
their
necks,
ambled
and
shambled.
Up
to
us,
baying
excelsior.
A
We
returned
home
through
the
poor
streets
where
only
a
few
children
fumbled
with
bare
red
fingers
and
the
wheel,
rutted
snow
and
cats
called
after
us,
their
voices
fading
away
as
we
trudged
uphill
into
the
cries
of
dock
birds
and
the
hooting
of
ships
out
in
the
whirling
bay
and
then
at
tea.
The
recovered
uncles
would
be
jolly
and
the
ice
cake
loomed
in
the
center
of
the
table
like
a
marble.
A
A
No
jack
said
good
king
wenceslas
I'll
count
three
one,
two
three
and
we
began
to
sing.
We
reached
the
black
bulk
of
the
house.
What
should
we
give
them
heart?
The
herald
no
jack
said:
go
king
wenceslas
I'll
count
three
one,
two
three
and
we
began
to
sing
our
voices
high
and
seemingly
distant
in
the
snow-felted
darkness
around
the
house
that
was
occupied
by
nobody.
We
knew
we
stood
close
together
near
the
dark
door.
A
Good
king
looked
out
on
the
feast
of
stephen
and
then
a
small
dry
voice
like
the
voice
of
someone
who
has
not
spoken
for
a
long
time
joined
our
singing
a
small
dry
eggshell
voice
from
the
other
side
of
the
door,
a
small
dry
voice
through
the
keyhole,
and
when
we
stopped
running
we
were
outside
our
house.
The
front
room
was
lovely
balloons
floated
under
the
hot
water
bottle,
gulping
gas.
Everything
was
good
again
and
shone
over
the
town.