THE GYPSIES CAME TO TOWN

Sceala Clann Counsellor Location: Tir Na Nog

THE GYPSIES CAME TO TOWN

Thus went the day the gypsies
Came to town when I was young
They came in wooden wagons
You could hear the songs they sung

With voices clear as the Angelus bell
The women wove their spell
Not a one of us ran scared for home
Under their magic we promptly fell

Our pale white cheeks all freckled
Were as boring as a yawn
We yearned to possess their olive skin
We wished our red locks gone

Oh to be exotic as gypsy women!
Instead of simple Irish lasses
And me especially because
I wore stupid black hornrimmed glasses

My friends and I in secret watched
As the lads from the village crept
Like thieves in the night to the tinkers' camp
And at dawn like thieves again left

Night after night they danced and drank
Brigid's brother Sean, me Uncle Kevin
And Aisling's eegit cousin Frank
You'd think they'd died and gone to heaven

They played cards with the swarthy men
While the gypsy girls stood by
And Brigid who was sweet on Aisling's cousin Frank
Said it was our sworn moral duty to spy

We learned a lot from those gypsy girls
When to wink and smile and flirt
How to throw back our heads whenever we laughed
Just how wide to swing our skirts

One morning the wagons were suddenly gone
Things fell into a eerie lull
Brigid, Aisling and me had no spying to do
Life had taken a turn towards dull

Brigid gave up her crush on young Frankie
She married a lad from up North
I got a job as a file clerk in Dublin
Aisling moved with her family to Cork

Funny how Life never again was the same
Once the magic in those wagons moved on
And I must confess I sometimes think
All our dreams up and left with that dawn

O the carefree life of a gypsy
What if we would have made friends
With the gypsy girls in those wagons?
Might the magic have stayed in the end?

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THE GYPSIES CAME TO TOWN