Cwtch

Lyrics

There isn't a word for it in English.
Of course there isn't.
It wouldn't fit.

The door opens on a November wind that bites.
My coat smells of damp wool and the wet slate on the mountain.
My fingers are stiff, red monuments to the cold.
And you are there, always there, by the fire, in the worn armchair.
The one with the faded red dragons on the arms, threads pulled loose by the cat.
You don't say a word.
You just look up from your knitting and open your arms.

And that is the cwtch.
Not a hug, not a cuddle, nothing so simple.
It is a building. A small room with a low ceiling.
A safe place built of arms and a woolen cardigan.
A harbor from the wind that blows right through the world.
My own cwtsh-bed, just for a moment, against your heart.

My face pressed into the hollow of your shoulder.
You smell of peat smoke clinging to the wool,
and faintly, of the yeast from the bread you baked this morning.
The comforting scratch of the Welsh blanket over my knees.
The whole world shrinks to the sound of the fire spitting,
the quiet, even rhythm of your breathing,
the slow, strong beat of your heart under my ear.

And that is the cwtch.
Not a hug, not a cuddle, nothing so simple.
It is a building. A small room with a low ceiling.
A safe place built of arms and a woolen cardigan.
A harbor from the wind that blows right through the world.
My own cwtsh-bed, just for a moment, against your heart.

They ask me for a translation. A neat little box.
I tell them it's the space under the stairs where you keep the good jam safe.
I tell them it's the 'ch' sound from the back of the throat, the one that stays in your accent no matter where you go.
But really, it's this memory. Your hands, sure on my back.
It is the living architecture of safety.
A place I built inside myself from your blueprint,
a room I can still enter, when the door opens on that same cold wind.

Nain.
Not a word.
Just a safe place.
A warm room.
Cwtch.