BlackForties©2022TonyFallon119
In the dark eighteen forties Ireland was England's breadbasket
That time dead thrown in mass graves without a coffin or casket
While ships sailed outward loaded with fresh meat and Irish grown grain
While sons of the landlord were educated in France or Spain
It was not the failing potatoes brought the ruination
But the result of land taken from natives pre plantation
Overworked fields never could provide an adequate harvest
So food was often scarce in winter when weather was harshest
The potatoes rotting in the ground meant certain starvation
Meanwhile clergy preached after hardship there would be salvation
With the passing centuries holdings got smaller and smaller
Indoor animals then added to the unhealthy squalor
Little old mud cabins built into ditches with roofs of straw
Through which in the springtime the left over ice did slowly thaw
Those behind on rent were evicted by lackeys of the squire
Cattle were more profitable, so the house was set on fire
Thrown out on the cold open windy road to face certain doom
No money in the pockets to buy groceries to consume
Families walking the roads children's bare feet covered in dirt
Crying from fatigue and thirst hanging on to their mother's skirt
Reduced to begging for a few pennies from heartless bosses
To die in fields and ditches without benefit of crosses
The living trying to get overseas with their last few pounds
Leaving their families and loved ones in villages and towns
Immigrants boarded old rotting ships which very well might wreck
Long before they safely reached the ports of Boston or Quebec
Four weeks on the rolling ocean without nurse or physician
With no treatments to lessen seasickness or malnutrition
Corpses were thrown overboard without any slowing motion
To become food for trailing sharks in the Atlantic Ocean
Hoping for a living wage and to somehow make their fortunes
And live a long life so their children did not grow up orphans
Then be treated like they were just a criminal or a spy
With big signs in the windows saying "No Irish Need Apply"
