Eamon Walsh is a lecturer in Information Technology and Head of Department at the School of Business in Galway Mayo Institute of Technology (GMIT). He has contributed regular columns and editorial pieces to local and regional newspapers over the years. He is a part-time musician, poet and campaigner for people with disabilities. He lives in Headford, Co. Galway with his wife and two children.

Special one

At once our lives were filled with joy
The birth of you, our precious boy.
We held you close and often said;
What boyhood dreams will he deploy?

We did not know what lay ahead
The years of strife and fear and dread.
Why us? Why you? Did we do wrong?
A label, all our dreams now dead?

But you are oh so very strong
To a mighty clan do you belong.
Your future can and should be rife
With friends and love and laughs and song.

Go on now son and live your life
Free from trouble, stress and strife.
Go on now son and live your dreams
A future bright, full of sunbeams.

For Peter
Eamon Walsh, December 2020.

Freedom

Winter sun glows warm on my skin
Stirs memories of long lost kin.
Nearby a heron glides in flight
And lifts my spirits once again.

My fathers and forefathers plight
To till the land with all their might.
Tremendous toil in fields of stone
Each one ingrained with tales of blight.

The land was not even their own
Through tyranny, seeds of freedom sown.
And so a mighty people rose
Together they were not alone.

The time had passed for words and prose
To fight oppressions might they chose.
And lost so many lives God knows
So we, now free, plough new furrows.
We bear no grudge, for we forgive
Our enemies sins so the young might live.

For Freedom
Eamon Walsh, December 2020.