E-tal ar groaz [English translation]

Beside the cross

In front of the naked Christ of stone,

Seven pine coffins

Passed on the footpath.

Seven pine coffins

Lead by pitiless Death,

Seven coffins of new pine

Have left this village,

Under the freezing showers of winter,

To the parish cemetery.

Seven old women, frail and toothless,

Are dead this winter,

And broken now with them,

In seven thatched cottages in Kêrnevez,

The gold ring, ring of the language

The gold ring that unites

New hearts

Of the children

With the hearts of the old.

Broken is the gold ring,

Broken is the ring,

The marvellous chain

That ties the present

With the remote

The past.

Seven old women are dead,

Seven women that kept with them

Bathed in the tall flames of the hearth

Spirit,

Beauty,

And the language of the ancestors.

Seven timber coffins,

In front of the Christ of stone,

And with them is dried up

A clean spring-head

Inspiration

The white.

In Kêrnevez,

On the green shores of the lake,

Alongside the hazel trees,

No more is it heard now.

Only

The language

Of the Stranger.

In this way sang Jakou Kerloaz,

In front of the naked Christ of stone,

Beside the cross.