Derailed by Treaties

by Carmel Smith

Partitions and Parliaments,
Signs and Smoke,
Boundaries and Barriers,
Divisions and Diversions,
Customs and Cultures,
Assents and Assassinations,
Embankments and Explosions….

In shadows of churches, on tracks to borderlands,
Crossing bridges, hooves and Royal Troops,
In carriages derailed by Treaties,
Falling to grace on banks,
In fields of bloodshed,
On this forgotten land.

Reproduced with kind permission of the author. This poem was composed in Poetry as Commemoration workshops held at Newry & Mourne Museum on 7th and 14th of October, 2023. The workshops were led by poet Maria McManus.

This poem was inspired by material relating to a train crash in Adavoyle near the border in South Armagh