The Love Child / William Barnes

The Love Child

 * Where the bridge out at Woodley did stride,
 * Wi' his wide arches' cool sheäded bow,
 * Up above the clear brook that did slide
 * By the poppies, befoam'd white as snow;
 * As the gilcups did quiver among
 * The white deäsies, a-spread in a sheet.
 * There a quick-trippèn maïd come along,-
 * Aye, a girl wi' her light-steppèn veet.
 * An' she cried "I do praÿ, is the road
 * Out to Lincham on here, by the meäd?"
 * An' "oh! ees," I meäde answer, an' show'd
 * Her the way it would turn an' would leäd:
 * "Goo along by the beech in the nook,
 * Where the children do plaÿ in the cool,
 * To the steppèn stwones over the brook,-
 * Aye, the grey blocks o' rock at the pool."
 * "Then you don't seem a-born an' a-bred,"
 * I spoke up, "at a place here about;"
 * And she answer'd wi' cheäks up so red
 * As a pi'ny leäte a-come out,
 * "No, I liv'd wi' my uncle that died
 * Back in Eäpril, an' now I'm a-come
 * Here to Ham, to my mother, to bide,-
 * Aye, to her house to vind a new hwome."
 * I'm asheämed that I wanted know
 * Any more of her childhood or life
 * But then, why should so feäir a child grow
 * Where no father did bide wi' his wife;
 * Then wi' blushes of zunrisèn morn,
 * She replied "that it midden be known,
 * "Oh! they zent me awaÿ to be born, -*
 * Aye, they hid me when some would be shown."
 * Oh! it meäde me a'most teary-ey'd,
 * An' I vound I a'most could ha' groan'd-
 * What! so winnèn, an' still cast azide-
 * What! so lovely, an' not to be own'd;
 * Oh! a God-gift a-treated wi' scorn
 * Oh! a child that a squier should own;
 * An' to zend her awaÿ to be born!-
 * Aye, to hide her where others be shown!
 * Oh! a God-gift a-treated wi' scorn
 * Oh! a child that a squier should own;
 * An' to zend her awaÿ to be born!-
 * Aye, to hide her where others be shown!

* Words once spoken to the writer


 * William Barnes, Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect (June 1879), p.382