Robert Etty
Orr
With acknowledgements to J.L.Carr and Welbourne's Dictionary
Orr looked three times as old as the next
oldest man and so people believed
he was nearly a hundred and six when
he fathered a bastard son by the bellringer's
bellringing daughter. They made him stand in the icy-blast
belfry with part of a blanket for penitence.
And a hundred and twenty-two and a half
when he married a widow whose name was Ann,
who was one hundred years to the month (almost)
younger. Thirty years later he left her
for Sheffield to find out the truth about modern life,
but he'd eaten just cabbage for thirty
years and the rich food played hell with his
circulation — at least, so the inquest said.
(The bastard son grew up white-faced and limping
and died at fourteen alone upstairs.)
oldest man and so people believed
he was nearly a hundred and six when
he fathered a bastard son by the bellringer's
bellringing daughter. They made him stand in the icy-blast
belfry with part of a blanket for penitence.
And a hundred and twenty-two and a half
when he married a widow whose name was Ann,
who was one hundred years to the month (almost)
younger. Thirty years later he left her
for Sheffield to find out the truth about modern life,
but he'd eaten just cabbage for thirty
years and the rich food played hell with his
circulation — at least, so the inquest said.
(The bastard son grew up white-faced and limping
and died at fourteen alone upstairs.)
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