The Dear Green Place

It was a clear mornin' down near Bann Where it meets and runs with the river Clyde And they tell the tale of the holy one Who was fishing down by the riverside The holy man, from Fife he came His name they say was Kentirgen And by the spot where the fish was caught The Dear Green Place was born Though the salmon run through the river stream And they salted them by the banks of Clyde And their faces glow'd as the silver flow'd And the place that rose by the riverside There was cloth and dye and horse to buy the traders came from all around And they raised a glass to the Dear Green Place The place that was a town

When the furnaces came to fire the iron And folk were thrown from foreign land And the Irishman and the Heilan' man And the hungry man came with willin' hands They wanted work, a place to live Their empty bellies needed filled And the farmyard was another world From the doubly overcrow'd mill Now you may have heard of the foreign trade And fortunes made by tobacco lords But the workin' man slaved his life away And an early grave was his sole reward A dreary room, a crowded slum Disease and hunger everywhere And the price to pay was another day And fight the anger and despair

A thousand years have been here and gone Since Kentiergan saw the banks of Clyde But how many dreams and how many tears In the thousand years of a city's life A city hard a city proud No mean city it has been Perhaps tomorrow it yet may be The Dear Green Place again...