by philipchevron Thu Nov 02, 2006 9:23 pm
If you ever go across the sea to Ireland,
Then maybe at the closing of your day,
You will sit and watch the moon rise over Claddagh,
And see the sun go down on Galway Bay.
Just to hear again the ripple of the trout stream,
The women in the meadow making hay.
Just to sit beside a turf fire in the cabin,
And watch the barefoot gosoons at their play.
For the breezes blowin' o'er the sea from Ireland
Are perfumed by the heather as they blow
And the women in the uplands diggin' praties
Speak a language that the strangers do not know.
Yet the stangers came and tried to teach us their way.
They scorned us just for bein' what we are.
But they might as well go chasing after moon beams,
Or light a penny candle from a star.
And if there's is going to be a life hereafter,
And somehow I am sure there's going to be,
I will ask my God to let me make my heaven,
In that dear land across the Irish sea.
(galway bay)
When I was a boy, we always had Christmas at my grandmother's home in Ballybough, Dublin, a flat above a bookie's where my father grew up. Every year, a very elderly neighbour called Bridgie Moran was also present for the Christmas Dinner. She had been a polio victim since childhood and otherwise lived alone, in the flats across the road. Every year, after a few post-prandial whiskies, she always gave us a song or two, and the first one was always "Galway Bay" and she always changed the last lines of the third verse to "And the women in the uplands diggin' praties/speak a language that the English does not know", spitting them out with some venom. Who knew what hardships this old Dublin woman experienced in her life?
In any event, this was the first I ever knew of "Galway Bay" and I still have a tape recording of her performing it. She's long dead now, but the meaning she attached to the song made a huge impression on me. I think the idea was, if the English were going to colonise the Irish, at least they would never colonise their hearts, their art, their modes of communication or, for that matter, their grammar.
If you ever go across the sea to Ireland,
Then maybe at the closing of your day,
You will sit and watch the moon rise over Claddagh,
And see the sun go down on Galway Bay.
Just to hear again the ripple of the trout stream,
The women in the meadow making hay.
Just to sit beside a turf fire in the cabin,
And watch the barefoot gosoons at their play.
For the breezes blowin' o'er the sea from Ireland
Are perfumed by the heather as they blow
And the women in the uplands diggin' praties
Speak a language that the strangers do not know.
Yet the stangers came and tried to teach us their way.
They scorned us just for bein' what we are.
But they might as well go chasing after moon beams,
Or light a penny candle from a star.
And if there's is going to be a life hereafter,
And somehow I am sure there's going to be,
I will ask my God to let me make my heaven,
In that dear land across the Irish sea.
(galway bay)
When I was a boy, we always had Christmas at my grandmother's home in Ballybough, Dublin, a flat above a bookie's where my father grew up. Every year, a very elderly neighbour called Bridgie Moran was also present for the Christmas Dinner. She had been a polio victim since childhood and otherwise lived alone, in the flats across the road. Every year, after a few post-prandial whiskies, she always gave us a song or two, and the first one was always "Galway Bay" and she always changed the last lines of the third verse to "[i]And the women in the uplands diggin' praties/speak a language that the English does not know"[/i], spitting them out with some venom. Who knew what hardships this old Dublin woman experienced in her life?
In any event, this was the first I ever knew of "Galway Bay" and I still have a tape recording of her performing it. She's long dead now, but the meaning she attached to the song made a huge impression on me. I think the idea was, if the English were going to colonise the Irish, at least they would never colonise their hearts, their art, their modes of communication or, for that matter, their grammar.
