Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect/Leaves a-vallèn

by William Barnes

LEAVES A-VALLÈN.

There the ash-tree leaves do vall
 In the wind a-blowèn cwolder,
An’ my childern, tall or small,
 Since last Fall be woone year wolder.
Woone year wolder, woone year dearer,
 Till when they do leave my he’th,
I shall be noo mwore a hearer
 O’ their vaïces or their me’th.

There dead ash leaves be a-toss’d
 In the wind, a-blowèn stronger,
An’ our life-time, since we lost
 Souls we lov’d, is woone year longer.
Woone year longer, woone year wider,
 Vrom the friends that death ha’ took,
As the hours do teäke the rider
 Vrom the hand that last he shook.

No. If he do ride at night
 Vrom the zide the zun went under,
Woone hour vrom his western light
 Needen meäke woone hour asunder;
Woone hour onward, woone hour nigher
 To the hopeful eastern skies,
Where his mornèn rim o’ vier
 Soon ageän shall meet his eyes.

Leaves be now a-scatter’d round
 In the wind, a-blowèn bleaker,
An’ if we do walk the ground
 Wi’ our life-strangth woone year weaker.
Woone year weaker, woone year nigher
 To the pleäce where we shall vind
Woone that’s deathless vor the dier,
 Voremost they that dropp’d behind.