February 7, 2004 Rest In Peace, Brendan Shannon
...25 January 2004

Visited the graveyard to-day, as I often do. It's a place where over the last thirty odd years myself and some of my friends have gone when we felt down or at a loss. It is also one of the few places that we could walk and talk about our past present and futures in relative peace.

I don't know why, but today I counted the graves in the "Republican Plot". There are twenty-two graves. I know volunteers in eighteen of the twenty-two graves. A lot of them have had their Headstones smashed. This put me to thinking of the many debates and conversations I had with some of those friends, now gone. I won't try to go into details regarding the content, and I certainly wouldn't be presumptuous to guess what they would be thinking if alive to-day. But, every single one of them, without exception, when they sacrificed their lives, believed in the Armed Struggle, that the Brits had no right to be here, and had no place in governing any part of Ireland.

So, I wonder, if there is a Heaven, and the boys and girls are looking down, watching people they believed in and trusted, who told them the only time we would be talking to the Brits would be when they were making arrangements to leave our country, who are not only talking to them, but who have legitimised their right to be here, addressing them on a first name basis and sipping cups of tea obviously enjoying their company.

As I look towards the shattered pieces of the graves of my friends my heart sinks in the realisation that not only have these memorial stones been smashed, but so too have the ideals for which these volunteers laid down their lives to achieve.

Brings a whole new meaning to the words "Rest in Peace".