Example of Dorset Dialect Poetry
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- THE LOVE CHILD
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- 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.
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- 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."
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- 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."
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- 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."
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- 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!
* Words once spoken to the writer
- William Barnes, Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect (June 1879), p.382
Read more about this topic: William Barnes
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