The Island

They say the skies of Lebanon are burning
Those mighty cedars bleeding in the heat
They're showing pictures on the television
Women and children dying in the street
And we're still at it in our own place
Still trying to reach the future through the past
Still trying to carve tomorrow from a tombstone...

Chorus

But Hey! Don't listen to me!
This wasn't meant to be no sad song
We've heard too much of that before
Right now I only want to be here with you
Till the morning dew comes falling
I want to take you to the island
And trace your footprints in the sand
And in the evening when the sun goes down
We'll make love to the sound of the ocean

They're raising banners over by the markets
Whitewashing slogans on the shipyard walls
Witchdoctors praying for a mighty showdown
No way our holy flag is gonna fall
Up here we sacrifice our children
To feed the worn-out dreams of yesterday
And teach them dying will lead us into glory...

Repeat chorus

Now I know us plain folks don't see all the story
And I know this peace and love's just copping out
And I guess these young boys dying in the ditches
Is just what being free is all about
And how this twisted wreckage down on main street
Will bring us all together in the end
And we'll go marching down the road to freedom...
Freedom

- Paul Brady, Back to the Centre (1985). Copyright © Hornall Brothers Music.

Sadly, some things never change. This is what Paul Brady says about writing this song:

Figuring out what to say about this song is almost as hard as writing it was in the first place. In early Eighties Ireland emotions were very high. Things had come to a head in the North. People were on hunger strike and dying. The Lebanon, Nicaragua, El Salvador, South Africa were all daily bearing witness to our capacity for cruelty, shortsightedness and greed. All around us politicians and public figures roaring drunk with their certainties.

I kind of wanted to give voice to this other ordinary man who was powerless to affect anything on a grand scale but was just trying to thread a way through all the emotional flak and stay in touch with what humans were designed to do. one to one. It was a controversial thing to be going on about at the time. If you're not with us, you're against us. Turning your back on your own. Many friendships ended in those days. The subsequent popularity of this song, due also in no small measure to Dolores Keane's beautiful rendition on 'A Woman's Heart' makes me feel that although I wasn't sure what I was dealing with, something was being said that needed to be said.