These are the exact lyrics I sing - most of them I got from 'The Ballads of a Bog Man' by Seigerson Clifford, but some I might have changed over the years - the important difference between this and the version just posted is 'to walk again that kindly street' as opposed to plural 'streets' and I sing we 'sang for joy'....

One of my all time favourite songs....


BOYS OF BARR NA SRAIDE
(Sigerson Clifford)

Oh the town it climbs the mountain and looks out upon the sea
At sleeping time or waking, it's there I long to be
To walk again that kindly street, the place where life began
With the boys of Barr na Sraide who hunted for the wren

With cudgels stout they roamed about to hunt the dreolin
We searched for birds in every furze from Litir to Dooneen
We sang for joy beneath the sky life held no print or plan
And the boys of Barr na Sraide went hunting for the wren

And when the hills were bleeding and the rifles they were aflame
To the rebel hills of Kerry the Saxon stranger came
But the men who dared the Auxies and who fought the Black and Tans
Were the boys of Barr na Sraide who hunted for the wren

And here's a health to those tonight, those boys who laughed with me
By the groves of Carham river or the slopes of Bi na Ti
John Daly and Batt Andy and the Sheehans, Con and Dan
they're the boys of Barr na Sraide who hunted for the wren

But now they toil in foreign soil where they have made their way
Deep in the heart of London town or over on Broadway
And I am left to sing their deeds and praise them while I can
Those boys of Barr na Sraide who hunted for the wren

and when the wheel of life runs down and peace comes over me
Oh lay me down in that old town between the hills and sea
I'll take my sleep in those green fields, the place where life began
With the boys of Barr na Sraide who hunted for the wren