I haved loved this song for years and kept thinking that the words were written by the Briens. wWen I got the proper words it felt so good. A lot of my mates who hear me play this as an accordion tune love the beat and the folks I play and sing for would like the tune played in a mambo beat at a good tempo (not too fast). I thought of some words of my own:

The first sound at 5 o'clock is birds singing,
The sound of blackbird and sparrow and one that never sings again - That bird is cauld the swallow.
My town of Edinburgh is a town to wake the children up with bird sounds, for what you do for your life.

That is a first verse that I wrote about the swallow and other birds to wake you up for collage work or school. My heart sees if you are a folk singer and a mate of mine try and put new words of your one like my friend Vicky. If it is a song you like why not write words you write can be about a blackbird (bird my friend Lissa likes). When I first knew the song the words had nothing to do with birds it was called 'She wears my Ring'. The first time I heard the first song was in the mudcat, I didn't know that there have been 20 English lyrics from 1907 to now still on the same story line, but difrent words.