Old Woman from Wexford

Song Meaning

This ditty kicks off with a classic setup: an old woman in Wexford who loves her husband, but apparently, a bit *too* much, as she loves another man even more. This sets up a domestic dilemma that quickly escalates from a simple affair to a rather dark, albeit darkly comedic, plot. The central tension arises from the woman's desire to be with her lover, which requires her husband's incapacitation. Her solution is to seek a potion from a doctor to make him blind, a request that reveals a chilling pragmatism beneath the folksy surface. The doctor's advice, to feed him eggs and marrow bones, sounds almost nurturing, but it's a Trojan horse for his eventual blindness. The narrative takes a sharp turn when the husband, now blind, contemplates suicide. The woman, instead of offering comfort, actively encourages him to drown himself, even offering to help push him in. This moment highlights a twisted partnership in their demise, or at least her willingness to expedite it. The ultimate irony arrives when she, attempting to push him into the water, is instead pushed in herself by the very man she sought to blind, who can't see her coming. The effectiveness of these lyrics lies in their deceptive simplicity and the abrupt shifts in tone. What begins as a tale of infidelity transforms into a darkly humorous, almost cautionary, story about unintended consequences and the perils of trying to outsmart fate, or in this case, a blind husband. The final lines offer a wry, almost cynical, piece of advice, turning the earlier plot point into a lesson about strategy in murder.