News Archive

Gladys–Mary Coles pays tribute to Edmund Gwilym Cusick

The news of the untimely death of Edmund at the age of forty-four will be received with great sadness by all who knew him, as I did, as a fine poet, true friend and brilliant academic.

Edmund was gifted and popular, a warm, genial personality, who gave generously of his time and was unfailing in his care and concern for others.
He was happiest by the side of a little river flowing near his home at Hendwr Bridge, near Corwen in Denbighshire, or on the Lleyn Peninsula where he took successive generations of students to enjoy and be inspired by the Wales he loved. His mother is Welsh and the family live in Powys, but his parental home, where he grew up was in Aberdeen. Here he attended university and took a first in English.

At Oxford, where he read for his PhD, Edmund worked as a lexicographer for the Oxford English Dictionary. He fulfilled a dream when he moved to Wales, taking the post of Lecturer in English Literature at Lampeter. Here he developed his passionate interest in Celtic literature and spirituality, myth and legend, and his own talent as a storyteller.

In 1991 Edmund was appointed to a post at Liverpool John Moores University, where first as Course Leader and later as Head of Department, he built up the Imaginative Writing programme, now flourishing at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. It was here that I first met him as a colleague, and discovered his poetry. Subsequently I published under the Headland imprint three outstanding volumes by Edmund: Gronw’s Stone: Voices from the Mabinogion (1997), a collection of poems; Blodeuwedd: an Anthology of Women Poets (2001); and Ice Maidens (2006), commended by John Burnside as "a marvellous collection". Edmund was the winner of several national poetry awards, including the Keats-Shelley Prize (2005) and the Housman Prize (1998). He contributed poetry to the New Welsh Review and Poetry Wales and was also a co-editor of and contributor to The Writer’s Workbook (Arnold, 2000).

A member of the Academi, Edmund was an enthusiastic supporter of Ty Newydd, where Gronw’s Stone was conceived. He fought to save the village school at Carrog, attended by his two small daughters, and requested that donations be sent to this school, near Corwen, to help to ensure its future. His wife Christina and daughters, Imogen and Amber, and step-daughters Dani and Abbi, and the students and staff at Liverpool John Moores University are planning a Memorial Service.

Gladys-Mary Coles

MORGANA

We will inherit that land of poppies, pomegranates
the bright isle which drowning men have seen
as the last darkness parts before their sight,
which rests, they say, beyond the furthest west,
but lies, in truth, beyond the stark horizon
at every com[pass point, to which the soul must turn,
quivering to stillness.

And while, from that glittering sea we turn our eyes
it sends its signals to us: the hush
after birdsong in the dusk, the red sun
sinking beneath the earth, and at the mass,
looking from face to face, we see its light there,
as each sips the blood of the eternal kingdom.

Apples, and apple wine, brewed sharp and sweet
as the serpent’s kiss, scents of cinnamon and clove
twine around the trees of those green glades
where we will meet again with those we loved,
and know them beautiful, as in their youth,
or in the hour when they were most themselves.

                                                  EDMUND CUSICK

                                 from Ice Maidens (Headland, 2006)

For further information on Edmund Cusick’s work please contact Headland Publications:

Ty Coch
Galltegfa
Llanfwrog
Ruthin
Denbighshire
LL15 2AR
0151 6259128