Slainte Mhath

A hand held over a candle in angst fuelled bravado

A carbon trail scores a moist fresh palm

Trapped in the indecion of another fine menu

And you sit there and ask me to tell you the story so far

This is the story so far

Shuffling your memories dealing your doodles in margins

You scrawl out your poems across a beermat or two

And when you declare the point of grave creation

They turn round and you to tell them the story so far

This is the story so far

And you listen with a tear in you eye

To their hopes and betrayals and your only reply

Is Slainte mhath

Princes in exile raising the standard Drambuie

Parading their anedoctes tired from old campaigns

Holding their own last orders commanding attention

We sit here and listen to all of the story so far

This is the story so far

Take it away, take it away, take it away

Take me away

From the dream on the barbed wire at Flanders and Bliston Glen

From a Clydesdale that rusts from the tears of its broken men

From the realisation that we've been left behind

Is to stand like our fathers before us in the firing line

Waiting on the whistle to blow, we stand here waiting

On the whistle to blow

They promised us miracles, and the whistle still blows

Broken promises, and the whistle still blows

The whistle still blow