Page:Lollingdon Downs and other poems, Masefield, 1917.djvu/50

44 XXI

No man takes the farm,

Nothing grows there,

The ivy's arm

Strangles the rose there.

Old Farmer Kyrle

Farmed there the last;

He beat his girl;

(It's seven years past).

After market it was

He beat his girl;

He liked his glass,

Old Farmer Kyrle.

Old Kyrle's son

Said to his father,

"Now, dad, you ha' done,

I'll kill you rather.

"Stop beating sister

Or by God I'll kill you."

Kyrle was full of liquor.

Old Kyrle said, "Will you?"