In London city where I did well A butcher boy, I loved right well He courted me, my life away But now with me, he will not stay Chorus I wish, I wish, I wish in vain I wish I was a maid again A maid again I ne'er will be 'Till cherries grow on an ivy tree I wish my baby it was born And smiling on its daddy's knee And me poor girl to be dead and gone With the long green grass growing over me She went upstairs to go to bed And calling to her mother said "Give me a chair 'till I sit down And a pen and ink 'till I write down" At every word she dropped a tear And at every line cried "Willie dear - Oh, what a foolish girl was I To be led astray by a butcher boy" He went upstairs and the door he broke He found her hanging from a rope He took his knife and he cut her down And in her pocket, these words he found Oh, make my grave large, wide and deep Put a marble stone at my head and feet And in the middle, a turtle dove That the world may know, that I died for love.