The Broad Black Brimmer

There's a uniform still hanging in what's known as father's room

A uniform so simple in its style

It has no fancy braid of gold, no hat with feathered plume

Yet me mother has preserved it all the while

One day she made me try it on, a wish of mine for years

In memory of your father Sean she said

And when I put the sam brown on,

she was smiling through hear tears

As she placed the broad black brimmer on me head

Chorus: It's just a broad black brimmer

with ribbons frayed and torn from the

careless whisk of many a mountain breeze

An old trench coat that's so battle-stained and worn

And breeches almost threadbare at the knees

A sam brown belt with a buckle big and strong

And a holster that's been empty many's a day

But when men claim Ireland's freedom

The one should choose to lead them

Will wear the broad black brimmer of the IRA

It was the uniform worn by me father year's ago

When he reached me mother's homestead on the run

It was the uniform he wore in that little church below

Whne oul Father Mac, he blessed the pair as one

And after truce and treaty and the parting of the ways

He wore it when he marched out with the rest

And when they bore his body down on that rugged heather braes

They placed the broad black brimmer on his chest

Chorus