Then I chatted on beside her
And I praised her hair and eyes
And, like roses from her basket
On her cheeks saw blushes rise;
With her timid looks down-glancing
She said, “Would I pass before?”
But I said that all I wanted
Was a smile, and nothing more.

So she shyly smiled upon me
And I kept still wandering on;
What with blushing, smiling, chatting
Soon a brief half-hour was gone.
Then she told me I must leave her
For she saw their cottage door
But I would not, till I rifled
Just a kiss, and nothing more.

And I often met that maiden
At the twilight’s lowing hour
With the summer’s offspring laden
But herself the dearest flower.
When she asked me what I wished for,
Grown far bolder than before
With impassioned words I answered
T’was her heart, and nothing more.

Thus for weeks and months I woo’d her
And the joys that then had birth
Made an atmosphere of gladness
Seem encircling all the earth.
One bright morning at the altar
A white bridal dress she wore;
Then my wife I proudly made her
And I ask for nothing more.

John Bolton Rogerson, ‘The Manchester Poet’.

This was John Bolton Rogerson’s first published poem and it appeared in The Manchester Guardian in 1826 when he was 17. It was sent in to Have Your Say by Maurice Taylor, a descendant of John Bolton Rogerson (see letters page).