NO BANQUET FOR YOU COMRADE, JUST A LONELY DEATH, IN A LONELY HELL.OGLACH BOBBY SANDS DIES AT I : 17 AM, 5TH MAY, 1981. LEST WE FORGET.

A LETTER TO BOBBY. { APRIL 2006}.

Óglach Bobby Sands Fuair sé Bás ar son saoirse na hÉireann

Mo chara, i still think of you with love and affection after all these long years. In many ways i feel disconnected since you left in May 1981 , it's been and still is a strange feeling.

I still think alot about that day in February 1981 when we met for the last time , at Sunday mass in the canteen , when we shook hands and you , more or less , bade goodbye to each of us that morning - what a feeling ! If i could , mo chara , i would bring you back to life , so all of this pain and inner sorrow, which at times plights my life , could end.

I have to tell you that when you died { the Dark , Brendan Hughes , shouted the news down the wing that morning } , i didn't cry , but silently thought to myself that you had escaped Criminalisation and had left us to face the battle on our own. A selfish thought i suppose . But now , in the fullness of time , i realise that in death you and the boys broke our chains and forever set us free , and for that i am eternally grateful.

I have tried to live a good life , one which would make you proud. The values which we shared in the H Blocks - honour ,brotherhood , integrity , courage and grit determination , i still aspire to in civilian life . My reference point has always been the Blanket protest in the H Blocks and the lessons learnt then have guided me ever since.

Sometimes when i am in bed during the stillness of the night , i can hear you speak to my heart and there are times i feel your presence so close to me that i reach out to touch you . It's not so strange , i tell myself ,because wasn't it you who told us not to worry about death , for rebels like us never really die - we live on in the hearts and minds of those we have touched on this earth.

Growing tired again mo chara , it's late and another day dawns . Looking forward to the day when i will see your face again , so until then keep watching over me and give me the strength to carry on.

Love , Seamus. xxx

Left to right - Bobby Sands and Seamus Kearney