Here is a sightly different version, with the Irish words in the chorus slightly altered, although the version presented above I have also heard sung.

I believe the translation of this version would be literally "Noble woman of my heart" but would be understood to mean "my dear good woman" or some other such ingratiating form of address to a higher-class woman from a poor beggar hoping for alms.

Childher was the way a Connemara farmer may have pronounced "children" more than 100 years ago (here it is in the Manx-English dialect dictionary of 1924 http://www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/fulltext/am1924/pt_c.htm Childher) and "j'ys" (rhymes with "highs") is colloquial pronunciation for "joys".

The second line of each verse (and the chorus) ends with a strong lilting note. I've indicated that by hyphenating the word the lilt appears in (e.g. parted = pa-arted)

The tune is most definitely not "Come Out Ye Black And Tans." It's slow and lilting, evoking the sadness of the farmer's story but also the hopefulness and strong faith he expresses at the end.


DAN O'HARA
(From the recording by Willie Brady, circa 1961)

1. Oh, sure, 'tis poor I am today,
For God gave and took away,
And He left without a home poor Dan O'Ha-ara.
In the frost and snow I stand
With these matches in my hand,
Just a poor and broken man from Connemara.

CHORUS: Arrah now, uaisle bean mo chroídhe,
Won't you buy a box from me?
And you'll have the prayers of Dan from Connema-ara.
I will sell them cheap and low.
Buy a box before you go
From your poor old broken farmer Dan O'Hara.

2. Well in the year of '64,
I had acres by the score
And the grandest land you ever ran a plow-ow through.
Ah, but the landlord came, you know,
And he laid my home so low,
So it's here I am today so broken-hearted. CHORUS

3. Now for 20 years or more,
Sure, misfortune crossed my door,
And the poor old wife and I were sadly pa-arted.
We were scattered far and wide.
All the childher starved and died,
And it's here I am today so broken-hearted. CHORUS

4. But though in frost and snow I stand,
Sure the shadow of God's hand
It lies warm about the brow of Dan O'Ha-ara;
And soon with God above,
I will meet the friends I love
And the j'ys I left behind in Connemara. CHORUS (slowing at the end)