Reckoning

Reckoning written by John Drinkwater

Poems 1908-14

Link to further information

I HEARD my love go laughing
Beyond the bolted door,
I saw my love go riding
Across the windy moor,
And I would give my love no word
Because of evil tales I heard.

Let fancy men go laughing,
Let light men ride away.
Bruised corn is not for my mill,
What's paid I will not pay, —
And so I thought because of this
Gossip that poisoned clasp and kiss.

Four hundred men went riding,
And he the best of all,
A jolly man for labour,
A sinewy man and tall ;
I watched him go beyond the hill,
And shaped my anger with my will.

At night my love came riding
Across the dusky moor,
And other two rode with him
Who knocked my bolted door,
And called me out and bade me see
How quiet a man a man could be.

And now the tales that stung me
And gave my pride its rule,
Are worth a beggar's broken shoe
Or the sermon of a fool,
And all I know and all I can
Is, false or true, he was my man.

This work is in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or less.