Within, Without
 I wrote just after we came back from Melbourne. I was thinking of it when we were in the green that was Ireland and how different the lands were. But Ned, Joe, Dan and Steve had never known Ireland so how could that place, which I would imagine would have been an almost mythical place to those that had been born in Australia, how could it be home. To them Australia was home but to others the authorities the priviledged they were undoubtedly Irish and did not belong...


This is our country
Our blood is it’s blood
No memories for us
Of those green shores of Ireland
This is the land of our birth

All we have known
Here we belong
Us to it and this land to us
Red blood tinged with red dirt
Wild country for wild hearts

We know her like our own hands
Every hilltop climbed
Our silhouettes proud against sky
This is our place, our home
This land that is ours

We do not dream of the return
Of walking soft green fields
We dream of jagged hills
Of scorching sun
And lines of dusty cattle

Our hearts are here
And so are our hopes
This is our place of comfort
The dirt that sings
Is no soft black soil

It is hard and harsh
And we know no mercy
But this land is free
Wild and unfettered
And we belong to her.