Dropkick Murphys - The Green Fields Of France

Well how do you do young Willie McBride

Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside

And rest for a while in the warm summer sun

I've been walking all day and I'm nearly done

And I see by your gravestone you were only 19

When you joined the great fallen in 1916

Well I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean

Or Willie McBride was it slow and obscene

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

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind

In some loyal heart is your memory enshrined

And though you died back in 1916

To that loyal heart you're forever 19

Or are you a stranger without even a name

Forever enshrined behind some old glass pane

In an old photograph torn tattered and stained

And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame

The sun's shining down on these green fields of France

The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance

The trenches have vanished long under the plow

No gas no barbed wire no guns firing now

But here in this graveyard that's still No Man's Land

The countless white crosses in mute witness stand

To a man's blind indifference to his fellow man

And a whole generation who were butchered and damned

And I can't help but wonder no Willie McBride

Do all those who lie here know why they died

Did you really believe them when they told you "The Cause"

Did you really believe that this war would end wars

Well the suffering the sorrow the glory the shame

The killing and dying it was all done in vain

Oh Willie McBride it all happened again

And again and again and again and again

• Artist:The Fureys
• Album: Warrior’s Code