eIrelander Contest Submission - The Fate of Young Johnny

Day 4,073, 07:16 • Published in Ireland Japan • by Violence Seth

This poem is my submission for the Ministry of Community's competition.

It's a poem/lyric about a story my Grandmother told me and my siblings when we were young. I'm not sure if it's true or not but it was always the same each year she told us it sitting by the fire in a cottage in Tullycross, Co. Galway.

The Fate of Young Johnny

There was a manor deep in Joyce land country
Were a Lord and Lady lived in harmony
They dined on rich foods daily in their dining hall
and had their servants bring them Indian tea
While they watched the sunset off their balcony

But oh their poor servants and their families
Were dying with their hunger and their plight
So as the day was ending there stood young Johnny
Making sure that he had his plan alright
Then he headed through the gale of the howling night

He waited dripping wet in the Lady's wardrobe
And held three yards of rope behind his back
As he heard the Lady's footsteps in the corridor
He readied his poor self for his attack
Oh he readied his scared self for his attack

He carried her wrapped tightly to the woodland
And she wriggled and she struggled all the way
He dropped her down and this is what he told her
This is what young Johnny had to say
I'm sorry ma'am but there is no other way

The Lord of the Manor found a letter
And in his fury he swiped his table clear
A thousand for the safe return of his Lady
And in his eyes there shone his angry tears
And in his mind lurked the shadow of his fears

The Lord called his guardsmen to his quarters
And ordered them scourge the town land red
Return to him his one and only lover
Find her captors and hang them 'til there dead
And pluck their sinful eyes from out their head

Young Johnny seen a glow down in the town land
And women’s cries where carried on the breeze
Young Johnny told the lady to keep silent
For men were searching for them through the trees
He held her mouth to stifle out her pleas

They found Young Johnny holding the fair Lady
With a dagger he held shaking in his hand
A thousand or she gets it, don't you test me
A thousand and safe passage through the land
And a boat awaiting me on Renvyles sand

They took poor shaking Johnny from behind him
And carried him out screaming through the gloom
He seen the burning homes of all his people
And seen the hanging rope that was his doom
And seen the hangman’s grin that was his doom

Then the Lord and the Lady were reunited
And together they both lived unquiet lives
In the daylight they heard their servants whispers
And dead of silence when the night arrived
Deadly silence when the dark of night arrived