Belfast Is Released

The troubles erupted in Belfast ,
It was August 1968 ,
I left like thousands of other people and said good bye at my front gate .

Good bye to the slaughter house .
Bloodbath fare thee well .
My heart now torn apart

It felt like I'd been evicted from life but still not able to depart.

Neither a soldier or terrorist ,
I had tasted victory and defeat .

Many of my friends were being murdered .
I was being shot at in the street .

The troubles had escalated in Belfast
It was 1969 .

The British Army arrived in Belfast
Some say , just in the nick of time .

I felt like millions of others people
helpless to institute a change .

So I returned back home to Belfast ,
But I was the one who was so strange .

I’ve been gone so long now that my friends and relations have forgotten me .

In the time I’d been away with all my homesick heartaches across the sea .

A lot had happened to Belfast ,
It was imprisoned and no longer free .

Both Catholic and Protestants had been interned ,
Nobody heard their plea .

In the village where I grew up ,
It had been surrounded by enemies .

So I had to leave my home again ,
Back in the mid nineteen seventies .

It was impossible to live with injustice .
I couldn’t live with hate .

So goodbye again to the bloodbath .
Fare thee well to the slaughter house gate .

I saw all that the TV had exposed and Belfast was in agony .

I watched far away in exile but never once did I ever feel free .

I went back a few more times , its been over thirty five
years since I left .

Each time I returned I saw Belfast burned
with tragedies of life and death .

Its now August 2007 and the British Army left .

I wonder if like me in leaving there ,they’ll feel a little bit bereft .

I hope that when the soldiers go back home to England
they can find some peace ,

Because I know what I’ve suffered ,
And I thank God Belfast has been released .

Belfast is free to be part of a link but has no more chains of sorrow .

Belfast has put its dark history behind and
Looked at a bright tomorrow .

By Paul Mc Cann