The Sickbed of Cúchulainn

[Verse 1]

McCormack and Richard Tauber

Are singing by the bed

There's a glass of punch below your feet

And an angel at your head

There's devils on each side of you

With bottles in their hands

You need one more drop of poison

And you'll dream of foreign lands

[Verse 2]

When you pissed yourself in Frankfurt

And got syph down in Cologne

And you heard the rattling death trains

As you lay there all alone

Frank Ryan bought your whiskey

In a brothel in Madrid

And you decked some fucking blackshirt

Who was cursing all the Yids

[Chorus]

At the sick bed of Cúchulainn

We'll kneel and say a prayer

But the ghosts are rattling at the door

And the devil's in the chair

[Verse 3]

And in the Euston Tavern

You screamed it was your shout

But they wouldn't give you service

So you kicked the windows out

They took you out into the street

Kicked you in the brains

So you walked back in through a bolted door

And did it all again

[Chorus]

At the sick bed of Cúchulainn

We'll kneel and say a prayer

And the ghosts are rattling at the door

And the devil's in the chair

[Verse 4]

You remember that foul evening

When you heard the banshees howl

There was lousy drunken bastards

Singing "Billy in the Bowl"

They took you up to midnight mass

Left you in the lurch

So you dropped a button in the plate

And spewed up in the church

[Verse 5]

Now you'll sing a song of liberty

For Blacks and Paks and Jocks

And they'll take you from this dump you're in

And stick you in a box

Then they'll take you to Cloughprior

And shove you in the ground

But you'll stick your head back out and shout

"We'll have another round"

[Chorus]

At the graveside of Cúchulainn

We'll kneel around and pray

And God is in His heaven

And Billy's down by the bay