My name is Maureen, I’m the tinker-town queen.
My caravan travels from Gort to Kildare.
When my pony went lame, I remembered the fame
of Biddy the healer, wise woman of Clare.
Bright star of the morning, she gave me fair warning:
“Under my bridge huddles Trouble-and-Pain.
For the sake of this bottle, the creature will throttle
both you and your horse as you cross its domain.”
I gave her a ring, hammered out like a wing,
I gave her green ribbons to tie up her hair,
a velveteen fan, and a new frying pan
and left with her blessing for Limerick Fair.
When we came to the bridge, my horse wouldn’t budge.
The bottle grew frightened, it trembled and sighed,
and the harder I held it, the stronger I felt it:
a ghostly hand grappled, a ghostly mouth cried,
“May your horse never walk, may your son never talk.
May the saber-toothed gnats make a nest in your hair.
May your logs never burn, may your dog never learn,
and your purse turn to feathers at Limerick Fair.
May your buttermilk bark, may your lanterns go dark,
and your skillets and petticoats take to the air.
May you drown in the lake, unless I can take
that bottle of Biddy’s, wise woman of Clare.”
When it reared up its head, I took courage and said,
“By my mother’s gold tooth and my father’s glass eye—”
Then down the bridge clattered, the bottle was shattered,
but Trouble-and-Pain was more frightened than I.
Some say life is brief as the fall of a leaf,
and nothing lives long that lives under the sun,
but friends and relations in five gypsy nations
shall whisper my story till stories are done.