Louisa

My beloved was taken ill he did not make it through
My 3 young boys are all i have now
We travelled cross the channel for promise of a better life
No such life was ours to be had
Our hunger was so great a loaf of bread I take
And soon the hands of law struck me down
The judge believed my boys were fit to strive alone
And hung a term of 7 years around my neck
In squalid filthy rank I travelled 4 months on the rough seas
Made only rougher by the hand of men
Sent to Hobart town to stare my sentence down
I worked all day as the settlers fortunes grew
My boys are young men now, my grief can not be told
Oh how I long to hold their face
This valley of death so cold and bitter
A lonely, sad, cold life for me here
But soon the sun shone and my unpaid work was done
I left these bitter walls a free woman
My heart once sorely closed opened once again
And so my story ends
A new path shines for me a future I can feel
Where happiness is somehow waiting for me