Also known as:

My gentle [B] harp, once more I [E] waken
The sweetness [B] of thy slumbering [F#7] strain
In tears our [B] last farewell was [E] taken
And now in [B] tears we [F#7] meet [B] again.

Yet even [E] then, while peace was [B] singing
Her halcyon [E] song o'er land and [F#7] sea
Though joy and [B] hope to [E] others [B] bringing,
she only [B] brought new [F#7] tears to [B] thee.

Then who can ask for notes of pleasure,
my drooping harp, from chords like thine?
Alas, the lark's gay morning measure
As ill would suit the swan's decline.

Or how shall I, who love, who less thee,
invoke thy breath for freedom's strains,
When e'en the wreaths in which I dress thee
Are sadly mixed, half flowers, half chains?

***Although these words by Thomas Moore are not the first to be put to this tune ( "Would I were Erin's apple blossom o'er you" by Alfred Graves puportedly are ), I like these more than the modern "Danny Boy" which is typically heard today.

I Recently found this quote on the internet: "To begin with, Danny Boy is one of over 100 songs composed to the same tune. The author was an English lawyer, Frederic Edward Weatherly (1848-1929), who was also a songwriter and radio entertainer. In 1910 he wrote the words and music for an unsuccessful song he called Danny Boy. In 1912 his sister-in-law in America sent him a tune called the Londonderry Air (or possibly something else, as discussed in Section 3), which he had never heard before. He immediately noticed that the melody was perfectly fitted to his Danny Boy lyrics, and published a revised version of the song in 1913. As far as is known, Weatherly never set foot in Ireland."