It May Be Cool Back There By Clara Mountain Poem by Francis Duggan

It may be cool back there by Clara mountain
Quite cool indeed for the first week of May
Still wild cock pheasant cucks amongst the rushes
And birds sing on the hedgerows all the day.

And cuckoo's voice re-echo through the woodlands
And swallows o'er the fields wing to and fro
And Springs have not changed much by Clara mountain
Since I was young some forty years ago.

In mountain stream I hear the dipper singing
And sparrow to her nest draw strands of hay
And black faced lambs in high fields by the mountain
Around their grazing mothers romp and play.

The farmer say his cows are down in milk yield
Grass growth is slow and Spring is late this year
But when I was a young boy in Claraghatlea North
Similar words I often used to hear

But Summer came to be followed by Autumn
And for his cows farmer had fodder till next Spring
And jackdaw flew with sticks to nest on chimney
And from April on nest building birds did sing.

It may be cool back there by Clara mountain
But skylark in the rain clouds sing and fly
And Springs have not changed much in old Duhallow
In more than forty years since I was a school going boy.