Poems (Cook)/Norah M'Shane
NORAH M'SHANE.
I've left Ballymornach a long way behind me, To better my fortune I've cross'd the big sea,But I'm sadly alone, not a creature to mind me, And, faith! I'm as wretched as wretched can be.I think of the buttermilk, fresh as a daisy, The beautiful hills and the emerald plain;And, oh! don't I oftentimes think myself crazy About that young black-eyed rogue, Norah M'Shane.
I sigh for the turf-pile, so cheerfully burning, When barefoot I trudged it, from toiling afar;When I toss'd in the light the thirteen I'd been earning, And whistled the anthem of "Erin-go-bragh."In truth, I believe that I'm half broken-hearted; To my country and love I must get back again;For I've never been happy at all since I parted From sweet Ballymornach and Norah M'Shane.
Oh there's something so dear in the cot I was born in, Though the walls are but mud, and the roof is but thatch;How familiar the grunt of the pigs in the morning, What music in lifting the rusty old latch!'Tis true I'd no money, but then I'd no sorrow; My pockets were light, but my heart had no pain;And if I but live till the sun shines to-morrow, I'll be off to old Ireland and Norah M'Shane.