Green Island
The island lies like a leaf upon the sea.
Green island like a leaf new-fallen from the tree.
Green turns to gold,
as morning breeze gently shakes the barley,
bending the yellow corn.
Green turns to gold,
there's purple shadows on the distant mountains,
sun in the yellow corn.
They came in their long ships from lands across the sea.
They came in their long ships and they saw the land was green.
Wind in the barley,
trout and salmon leaping in the rivers,
sun in the yellow corn.
Leaping ashore
they slaughtered those laboured in the barley,
scything them down like corn.
The long ships sailed away and new invaders came.
With long bow and lance bringing death in England's name.
With sword and with mace,
they went reaping though the fields of barley,
blundering the yellow corn.
Crop followed crop,
they prospered in their killing fields of barley,
harvest of new young corn.
Marching down the years the men of war they came,
with bombs assassin's bullets, cs-gas and guns.
Ghosts from the past
are chasing shadows through the fields of barley
hiding in the new young corn.
Nine hundred years
they tried to trap the wind that shakes the barley
sun in the yellow corn.
The island lies like a leaf upon the sea.
Green island like a leaf new-fallen from the tree.
Green turns to gold,
as morning breeze gently shakes the barley,
bending the yellow corn.
No force on Earth
can ever trap the wind that shakes the barley
sun in the yellow corn.
