Tipperary Days



Oh, weren't they the fine boys! You never saw the beat of them,
    Singing all together with their throats bronze-bare;
Fighting-fit and mirth-mad, music in the feet of them,
    Swinging on to glory and the wrath out there.
Laughing by and chaffing by, frolic in the smiles of them,
    On the road, the white road, all the afternoon;
Strangers in a strange land, miles and miles and miles of them,
    Battle-bound and heart-high, and singing this tune:

It's a long way to Tipperary,
    It's a long way to go;
It's a long way to Tipperary,
    And the sweetest girl I know.
Good-bye, Piccadilly,
    Farewell, Lester Square:
It's a long, long way to Tipperary,
    But my heart's right there.

"Come, Yvonne and Juliette! Come, Mimi, and cheer for them!
    Throw them flowers and kisses as they pass you by.
Aren't they the lovely lads! Haven't you a tear for them
    Going out so gallantly to dare and die?
What is it they're singing so? Some high hymn of Motherland?
    Some immortal chanson of their Faith and King?
'Marseillaise' or 'Brabanc,on', anthem of that other land,
    Dears, let us remember it, that song they sing:

"C'est un chemin long 'to Tepararee',
C'est un chemin long, c'est vrai;
C'est un chemin long 'to Tepararee',
Et la belle fille qu'je connais.
Bonjour, Peekadeely!
Au revoir, Lestaire Squaire!
C'est un chemin long 'to Tepararee',
Mais mon coeur 'ees zaire'."

The gallant old "Contemptibles"! There isn't much remains of them,
    So full of fun and fitness, and a-singing in their pride;
For some are cold as clabber and the corby picks the brains of them,
    And some are back in Blighty, and a-wishing they had died.
And yet it seems but yesterday, that great, glad sight of them,
    Swinging on to battle as the sky grew black and black;
But oh their glee and glory, and the great, grim fight of them! --
    Just whistle Tipperary and it all comes back:

It's a long way to Tipperary
    (Which means "'ome" anywhere);
It's a long way to Tipperary
    (And the things wot make you care).
Good-bye, Piccadilly
    ('Ow I 'opes my folks is well);
It's a long, long way to Tipperary --
    ('R! Ain't War just 'ell?)

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:58 min read
97

Quick analysis:

Scheme ababacac DeDeDbDb afafghgh BbBxibBx ajajakak DbDbDiDi
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 2,114
Words 375
Stanzas 6
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8

Robert William Service

Robert William Service was a poet and writer sometimes referred to as the Bard of the Yukon He is best-known for his writings on the Canadian North including the poems The Shooting of Dan McGrew The Law of the Yukon and The Cremation of Sam McGee His writing was so expressive that his readers took him for a hard-bitten old Klondike prospector not the later-arriving bank clerk he actually was Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston England but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894 Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk and became famous for his poems about this region which are mostly in his first two books of poetry He wrote quite a bit of prose as well and worked as a reporter for some time but those writings are not nearly as well known as his poems He travelled around the world quite a bit and narrowly escaped from France at the beginning of the Second World War during which time he lived in Hollywood California He died 11 September 1958 in France Incidentally he played himself in a movie called The Spoilers starring John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich more…

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