A Gradely Prayer
By Charles Allen Clarke (Teddy Ashton).
From ‘My North Countrie – An anthology of poetry and prose of the northern counties’ collected and arranged by Wilfred Pickles. George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1955.
One of those Lancashire dialect poems that illustrate the values of self-reliance and compassion that many lived by in the nineteenth century.
A Gradely Prayer
Give us, Lord, a bit o’ sun,
A bit o’ wark, an’ a bit o’ fun.
Give us aw in th’ struggle an’ splutter,
Eaur daily bread – an’ a bit o’ butter.
Give us health, eaur keep to make,
An’ a bit to spare for poor folk’s sake;
Give us sense, for we’re some of us duffers,
An’ a heart to feel for them that suffers.
Give us, too, a bit of a song,
An’ a tale an’ a book to help us along;
An’ give us eaur share o’ sorrow’s lesson
That we may prove heaw grief’s a blessin’.
Give us, Lord, a chance to be
Eaur gradely best, brave, wise, an’ free;
Eaur gradely best for eaursels an’ others,
Till all men larn to live as brothers.