Green Farney Hills - Sligo Poets

Sligo Nationalist 29 November 1913

    My Own Green Farney Hills

She stood on the ranch’s verandah
    At close of an autumn day,
And she looked o’er the stretching prairie
    Where the deep Ohio lay,
And her gaze went along the river
    With its winding silver sheen;
And she murmured softly to herself,
    Thinking of days that had been—

              (Chorus).
    It is harvest time in Ireland,
        The land I love so well;
    Ah, dear to me is my sireland,
        Far dearer than words can tell;
    But sadly alone I’m repining,
        And sorrow my bosom fills,
    As I think of the bright moon shining
        On my own green Farney hills.

And, in musing, her thoughts oft wandered
    Back to dear old Carrick town—
To her fond playmates of other days
    Who had never worn a frown;
And she thought of a lad, the dearest,
    The boy of her heart’s delight,
And she spoke this time in ecstacy
    As she stood in the dim twilight.

   It is harvest time in Ireland,
        The land I love so well;
   Ah, dear to me is my sireland,
        Far dearer than words can tell;
   I’ll be back to you, dear lover mine,
        Once more by the rippling rills
   When the harvest moon again doth shine
        On my own green Farny (sic) hills.

                        BRIAN MacBRIDE.
 Broomfield.

This is a typical version of an Irish exile poem or song where the author, usually in America, pines for Ireland and a lover left behind. It is unusual in that the emigrant is a woman and the left-behind lover is a man. She has also travelled well beyond the usual east coast cities, to the paraires near the Ohio river.

The author is unknown and there is no record of this poem online that I can find. I have been unable to find this Brian (or Bryan) MacBride (or McBride) in the 1901 or 1911 Census.

There appears to be only three Brian McBrides (no Brian MacBride) in the 1911 Census, two in their early twenties in Donegal but these were born in Donegal. In Broomfield in 1911 there were a number of McBride families but no Brian. In 1901 Bryan McBride lived in Cornahawla, Broomfield, Monaghan aged 87.

Farney is a barony in south Monaghan and the county has sometimes been known, especially in G.A.A. circles, as the Farney County. Broomfield is between Castleblayney and Carrickmacross in Monaghan and the Carrick mentioned in the poem presumably refers to Carrickmacross. It is strange to have a Monaghan poem printed in a Sligo newspaper.

It is well-composed, with a fluent rhythm and competent rhymes apart from the repetition of the Ireland/sireland rhyme.