He passed from this world in the H Blocks of Long Kesh, a concrete and barbed wire hellhole the British called HMP Maze.
Yesterday we gathered with his family in the graveyard where he lies at rest to honour his memory.
On a hill above the graveyard an ancient standing stone can be seen just beyond the towering trees. The majestic Benbradagh Mountain, steeped in the folklore of Dungiven, with tales of Finvola, the Gem of the Roe, and the banshee Grainne Rua, changes colours with the shifting light.
These were the memories which surely lifted Kevin as he peered through the concrete bars of his filthy cell at the clouds drifting overhead. His hometown lay beyond the Sperrins but it was the high walls and the wire fences which separated him from those he loved.
His desire to free his country from the yoke of the tyrant burned in his heart just as brightly as the fire in his mother's hearth.
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam uasal.
Lovely Tribute.
ReplyDeleteAnthony looking back now on the events of 81 and the lives lost, as someone who endured the hell holes of Long Kesh.
What are your thoughts today, and from that period
Lou, Dixie is very good at this type of thing and it is lovely, indeed.
DeleteI never regret it Lou in any personal sense of loss or feeling I missed out on something. But I believe it was all for nothing. I don't think what we had have today comes remotely near what we set out to achieve. It seems to me that it could have been won without the armed struggle or the deaths that accompanied it. We became like those we opposed while they never became like us.
Dixie often makes the point that long after the decision was taken to cash in the chips, people were still being sent out to risk life and liberty - their own and others - for an objective that they were not told would be the sum of their efforts.
The saddest thing about the hunger strike is not what the Brits did as vile as it was - they were the enemy and we can expect it from them - it was what some of our own leaders did in deciding to let six men die. As was once written: “The saddest thing about betrayal is it never comes from your enemies.”
R.I.P. Brave son of Ireland.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu0L7ue474E
That is very, very true. "The saddest thing about betrayal is it never comes from your enemies"a simple but very accurate analysis.
ReplyDeleteCaoimhin O'Muraile