The Feud

[James Curry]

I came across this years ago in my grandfathers Bible a few years ago. I was just browsing through posts on FB tonight and there it was again.

The Feud.
By James Young.
Do ye mind my wee lad Sammy, the best wee lad you’d meet.
It only seems like yesterday he was running round this street
Ach of course you mind wee Sammy .of course you mind him well
Sure he used to run the messages for Henderson’s Hotel
Aye thon was my wee lad Sammy ,he was wee as wee lads go
But a desperate lad for fighting, he would clatter friend or foe.
Of course there was nothing in it, it was only childish fun,
And there was never no hard feelings no matter who lost or who won
Until this young lad Devlin moved into our wee street
He would pick a row with Sammy every time they’d meet.
I warned him agin young Devlin, to avoid him like the plague
For there’s hardly need to tell ye that young Devlin was a Taig.
But evening after evening, coming home from school
He would pick a row with Sammy, about religion as a rule
And one word brung another, one orange and one green .
Sammy slagged his Holiness and Devlin damned the Queen.
And soon the fists were flying as they often flew before
As they fought for faith and freedom till they couldn’t fight no more.
Then one day the Devlins left us, I think they owed some rent
And I’m not sure where they went to, but the main thing was, they went.
And I think Wee Sammy missed him but I was awful glad
Because thon religious feuding can only come to something bad.
The years went by and Sammy left his schooldays far behind
He forgot about young Devlin , he had better things to mind.
Until one Saturday evening coming out of Windsor Park
He heard a Glens supporter make a cutting auld remark.
He thought he recognised the voice and as yer man came past.
Wee Sammy nearly fainted, it was Devlin to the last
Devlin recognised him and as yer man came up,
He said “Hello ye Orange Black mouth” and says Sam “Ye Papish Pup”
And one word brung another, one orange and one green.
Sammy slagged his Holiness and Devlin damned the Queen.
And soon the fists were flying as they often flew before
As they fought for faith and freedom till they couldn’t fight no more.
It was just a chance encounter and Sammy soon forgot
He had other things to bother him, redundancy and that.
The place where he was working was sinking very low.
And then one Friday evening Wee Sam was taul he would have to go.
No job and not much prospect, he was in a shocking state.
And he thought the only answer was for him to emigrate.
I tried to talk him out of it but he wouldn’t change his mind
And he sailed of to America to see what he could find
Later on he wrote and taul me he was thriving in New York
With a lovely motor all his own, and a flat beside his work.
Now the man that said this world was small talked a lot of sense
For later on he wrote and taul me of a strange coincidence
One evening in Manhattan he was walking down the street,
When he met the one man in this world that he thought he would never meet.
It was Devlin sure as blazes, the Taig he used to know
And Devlin nearly fainted when Wee Sam stopped and said “Hello”
They exchanged some friendly greetings as they always used to do
And then went into the nearest pub to have a drink or two.
And one word brung another, one orange and one green.
Sammy slagged his Holiness and Devlin damned the Queen.
And soon the fists were flying as they often flew before
As they fought for faith and freedom till they couldn’t fight no more.
And then they stopped and they started laughing, laughed till their sides were sore
At the things that seemed to matter in the life they had shared before
Every week I got a letter, each one better than the last
But somehow I had a funny feeling that Wee Sam was lonely for Belfast
More and more he wrote of Ireland and the people that he knew
And the letters sounded lonely and they made me lonely too.
Then the letters stopped coming and by God I wondered why.
And I even wrote and asked him but I never got no reply.
I heard no more of Sammy for a long time after that
And I wondered what he was doing at what the lad was at
Then last week I got a letter and it went on to explain
That Sammy and Young Devlin had confronted once again
Of course there as some trouble, that was natural so to speak
But this time it was different, as the letter said last week
This time they fought together, Young Devlin and wee Sam
They fought and they died as friends together on a hill in Vietnam.

[Harry Nicholson]

It reads as though there are veins of truth in the body of that poem.

[Harry Nicholson]

I enjoy shoving words around, but have not tried verse for a couple of years. I gave it a try the other day, and this appeared. It's about tides - so maybe it will be ok here.

Lindisfarne is Just Across

His spirit is there,
And I’d like a few words
But his bones are adored now
Under an ornate pile of masonry
On a bend high above the Wear.

His spirit is not far. Just over there
Across a couple of miles of mudflat,
Over the singing seals.

There’s nowt between Cuthbert and me
Save the gathering tide of disbelief
That smothers the footprints of Cuddy’s duck
And Man, as though they never did exist.

Families of geese bell in
From Spitzbergen, and are pleased
To find a few bits of seagrass,
But it’s pizza for me.
I’d better switch the oven on,
And give up gazing at stranded sea dragons
And frosted kelp, and seamarks stood about
Like totems of pagan priests.

A tide of change sweeps in and smothers
The tiny twitterings and haunted tickings of black ooze
And the stillborn burrowings of billions.

Now in the dying light across the flood -
The flight of birds, the cries, the beat of wings:
Eider, Sheldrake, Greenshank, Wigeon, Whooper,
Piper of the Sands, the Peewit, and the Smew,
And at the end of it all - calling the night down -
The Whaup.


17/8/22