The Troubles Have Passed : Narrative Poetry

We put up the barricades, they tore them down again .
It was August 69 just after the parades .
There were no escapades behind fallen barricades .
Belfast was blasted left right and centre,
' then it came, internment .
Suspected guilty because of a name.
Out came the bullets and guns.
Our town was torn apart .
We offered up our novenas to the sacred heart .
We kept our faith .
We prayed for peace .
We held up our heads as our doors were kicked in .
They dragged us out of our beds .
Snipers perched on the roof tops .
Children played in the street .
Protected by the tapping of a different beat .
We said our prayers and stayed alive.
We all grew up fast .
Mixed up in a situation caught up in the past .
Our houses burned around us .
Our graveyards where filled .
War drums have been beaten and our blood has since been spilled .

By Paul McCann