O many a Christmas in Ireland,
I would race with the boys on the pleasant strand,
With my hurling-stick in my baby hand,
And but little sense to guide me!
And, och, och, Eire, O!
Sad is the exile from Eire, O!
'Tis my heart that is heavy and weary!
Lonely and drear is this foreign plain,
Where I hear but my own voice back again,
No call of the corncrake, cuckoo, or crane,
Now awakens me on a Sunday!
Then, och, och, Eire, O!
Lost is the exile from Eire, O!
'Tis my heart that is heavy and weary!
O, had I a boat and a single oar,
With the help of God I'd reach Erin's shore,
Nay, the very tide might drift me o'er,
To die at home in Erin!
Now, och, och, Eire, O!
Would I were back in Eire, O!
'Tis my heart that is heavy and weary!
[THE FISHERMAN'S KEEN]
Or the lamentation of O'Donoghue of Affadown ("Roaring Water"), in the west of Co. Cork, for his three sons and his son-in-law, who were drowned.
O loudly wailed the winter wind, the driving sleet fell fast,
The ocean billow wildly heaved beneath the bitter blast;
My three fair sons, ere break of day, to fish had left the shore,
The tempest came forth in its wrath—they ne'er returned more.
Cormac, 'neath whose unerring aim the wild duck fell in flight,
The plover of the lonesome hills, the curlew swift as light!
My firstborn child! the flower of youth! the dearest and the best!
O would that thou wert spared to me, though I had lost the rest!
And thou, my handsome Felix! in whose eye so dark and bright
The soul of courage and of wit looked forth in laughing light!