Just to hear again the ripple of the trout stream,
The women in the meadows making hay,
And to sit beside a turf fire in the cabin
And watch the barefoot gossoons at their play.

For the breezes blowing o’er the seas from Ireland
Are perfumed by the heather as they blow,
And the women in the uplands digging praties
Speak a language that the strangers do not know.

For the strangers came and tried to teach us their way,
They scorn’d us just for being what we are,
But they might as well go chasing after moonbeams,
Or light a penny candle from a star.

And if there 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.

Dr Arthur Colahan (1885-1952)