Liam Clancy - Green Fields Of France

CHORUS
Did they beat the drum slowly did they play the fife lowly,
did they sound the death march as they lowered you down
did the band play the last post and chorus,
did the pipes play the "Flowers of the Forest"

Well how do you do young Willie McBride?
do you mind if I sit down here by your graveside
and rest for a while 'neath the warm summer sun
I've been walkin' all day and I'm nearly done
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
when you joined the great fallen of 1916
Well I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean
Willie McBride was it slow and obscene CHORUS

And the beautiful wife or the sweetheart for life
in some faithful heart are you forever enshrined
and although you died back in 1916
in that faithful heart are you forever nineteen?
or are you a stranger without even a name
enshrined forever behind a glass pane
in an ould photograph torn tattered and stained,
fading to yellow in a brown leather frame? CHORUS

Now the sun shines down on the green fields of France
a warm summer wind makes the red poppys dance
The trences have vanished under the plows,
there's no gas no barbed wire, there's no guns firing now
but here in this graveyard it's still No Man's land,
the countless white crosses stand mute in the sand
for man's blind indifference to his fellow man,
to a whole generation that was butchered and damned CHORUS

Now Willie McBride I can't help wonder why
Do those who lie here do they know why they died
Did they really beleive when they answered the call
did they really believe that this war would end wars
Forever this song of suffereing and shame
the killing the dying was all done in vain
for young Willie McBride it's all happened again,
and again, and again, and again and again

Category:

Music

Tags:

• folk

[hanshotfirst1138]

I think that if angels can sing, they must sound like Liam Clancy.

[catsireland]

I don't understand how some people mock this amazing man. Something tells me they're just jelous...

[joeygsmom]

They could change the title to "Sands of Afghanistan" and it would be the same today. Waste of life...leave the fat politicians to fight it themselves, the poor always pay the price for rich peoples follie's.

[jgjgaja]

Liam could get tears from a stone. 

[theloudhalo]

@patsyod I absolutely agree.

[Horsemarine100]

@hanshotfirst1138 He's probably giving them lessons now! That's why God called him.

[disneydanny2]

@hanshotfirst1138 of course if their was more than one the other would probably sound like Tommy Makem

[JMemski]

First place I heard this- School assembly.

[RPenta]

@jmanbloom Do those victims include the untold number of Iraqis and Afghans and Pakistanis and Somalis?

You know this is an anti war song-maybe the greatest ever done?

[Emilyismysunshine]

@dustysailor1 I've been to them a few times. It brings a lump to my throat and a tear to my eye everytime. All those white crosses make it the saddest place I've ever visited.

[bmck1956]

What a singer -he was the world's greatest interpreter of how to sing a ballad or a rebel song.

[patsyod]

Liam had a voice like honey, the only other singer that equalled him is Luke, both were absolutely incomparable