There’s not a chance now that I might recover

one syllable of what that sick man said,

tapping upon my great-grandmother’s shutter,

and begging, I was told, a piece of bread;

That winter night round the blazing turf,

The children on the hobs, the talk ran on

Most from the farmer and his sister Kitty

His wife not holding much with superstitions,

To rhyme and ramble through familiar stories

Of ghosts and fairies, witches, blinks and spells.

I sat aloft on Slieve Mor hill

Watched in silence the valley round

Slieve Gullion rising to the sky

The Cowans sweeping to the ground.

 

When they found out that it was a cod, like

They wouldn’t admit they’d been had!

They built a big plant outside of Moscow

Turnin’ out Steam Traps like mad!

My black hills have never seen the sun rising,

Eternally they look north towards Armagh.

Lot‘s wife would not be salt if she had been

Incurious as my black hills that are happy

When dawn whitens Glassdrummond chapel.

Now the ship was the finest ever seen

An’ they sent it away off to the Turks

An’ they toul’ them, that Steam Trap’s a secert

We’re the on’y ones know how it works!’

Now they built a big ship down in Bell-Fast

Construed for till sell to the Turks

And they called on the Yard’s chief designers

To test all the engines and works

An’ finally the engines were ready

And they screwed on the very last part

An’ yer man says, ‘Let’s see how she runs, lads’,