7

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 ripples of the trout stream,
The women in the meadows making hay,
To sit beside a turf fire in a cabin
And watch the barefoot gossoons at their play.

For the breezes blowing 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.

And if there’s 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.

* * *

‘YOKE THE PONY’ is an acclaimed…