verse 1
G
Matty walked out on a frozen night
C G
Making for the pub, shoulders hunched up tight
C G
Head down on the railroad track
D G
And his old cow Delia sad lowing him back
G
He met with a dark and staggering man
C G
And as he passed him by shouted back at him
C G
"Hey Matty, can't you see what's become of me
D G
In this country of the blind!
D G
The house I have left is dead to me
D G
To my rhyming and my poetry
C
All I've got is the beat of the stagger
D G
Heading down the Curragh line!"
verse 2
G
But Matty passed on as quick as he could
C G
He couldn't stand such a drunken man sober
C G
All he wanted was the lights of the bar
D G
The Nightingale, the Wild Rover
D G
When he came in they were sighing
G
"Look who's back, Did they throw you out of Jack's
G
With your spoutin' and your swearin'
D G
We don't want to hear about Bunker Hayden
C D G
But maybe you'll sing us the Girls of Kinkane"
Instrumental
G C G C G D G
verse 3
G
The Fear an Tí eyed him steadily
C G
As he handed him a pint of porter
C G
"You must have seen the bishop's ghost tonight
D G
To put the dry look back in your eye!"
G
But Matty would not be taken in
C G
By their jibin' and their regalin'
C G
He found himself a fresh-blown crew
D G
And fell in with their sportin' and their balin'
verse 4
D G
As he was going home, on the very same spot
D G
He met with his dark familiar
C
He seen him coming back down the line
D G
He was bright and strange and fine
G
As he passed him by, Matty threw out his arms
C G
Trying to grab hold of his likeness
C G
In the morning all the found was his frozen corpse
D G
At the butt of the Curragh line
D G
At the wake they were lashing out the drops of brandy
G
The aul-fashioned habit
D G
In the church they were lashing down pounds and fivers
C D G
So Matty would be fine in the old by and by