Wild cries the Winter, and we walk song-haunted
Over the moors and by the thundering falls
Or where the dirge of a brave past is chaunted
In dolorous dusks by immemorial walls
Though rains may thrash on us, the great mists blind us
And lightning rend the pine-tree on the hill
Yet we are strong, yet shall the morning find us
Children of tempest all unshaken still

A darkling violet, fringed anew
With light that on the mountains soar
A dusky flame on tranquil shores;
Kindling the summits as they grow
In audience to the skies that call
Ineffable in rest and all

The hills slipped over each on each
Till all their changing shadows died

There's deer upon the mountain
There's sheep along the glen
The forests hum with feather
But where are now the men?
Here's but my mother's garden
Where soft the footsteps fall
My folk are quite forgotten
But the nettle's over all

O! black might be that ruin
Where my fathers dwelt so long
And nothing hide the shame of it
The ugliness and wrong;
The cabar and the corner-stone
Might bleach in wind and rains
But for the gentle nettle
That took such a courtier's pains

The friends are all departed
The hearth-stone is black and cold
And sturdy grows the nettle
On the place beloved of old

[Instrumental]