by Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862)
I am the little Irish boy
Language: English
I am [the]1 little Irish boy That lives in the shanty I am four years old today And shall soon be one and twenty I shall grow up And be a great man And shovel all day As hard as I can. Down in the deep cut Where the men lived Who made the Railroad. For supper I have some [potato]2 And sometimes some bread And then if it's cold I go right to bed. I lie on some straw Under my father's coat My mother does not cry And my father does not scold For I am a little Irish Boy And I'm four years old.
View original text (without footnotes)
2 Blom: "potatoes"
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
Confirmed with The Book of Irish American Poetry: from the Eighteenth Century to the Present, ed. Daniel Tobin, University of Notre Dame Press, 2007.
1 Blom: "a"2 Blom: "potatoes"
Text Authorship:
- by Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862), "I am the little Irish boy" [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Diana Blom , "I am the little Irish boy", 2018 [ tenor and piano ], from Portrait of America, no. 2, Wirripang Publishing [sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2021-02-01
Line count: 22
Word count: 107