It Is Not The Homeland Poem by Francis Duggan

It is not the Homeland that I think of but mostly about the Homeplace
About the old Town I was born and raised near where mine did become a known face
The home of the snipe and the badger, the jackdaw the rook and gray crow
I will die a migrant from Duhallow where the mighty Blackwater flow

Through old fields that will be forever by many a wood and hedgerow
It has babbled on towards the Atlantic for how long would anyone know
Through North Cork in flood it often rages in it's swirling flood waters of brown
On to the Atlantic near Youghal by many a village and town.

A migrant from distant Duhallow is all that I ever can be
If I told you anything different the one I'd be fooling is me
My accent did come from Duhallow and the Duhallow brogue I retain
I am a migrant in this Country and as a migrant here I will remain

Till my life will be claimed by the Reaper the Reaper who claims the lives of all
Eventually sooner or later to his sharp scythe everyone fall
But it is not the Homeland I think of but my Homeplace near the Town of Millstreet
And that lush and green and beautiful landscape where the Finnow and Blackwater meet.