THE DEPRIVED... Part 1.

A continuation of my book.

The sun had no right to shine and nor did the sun shine on the day that Michael O’Brien and Patsy Flynn lifted the coffin onto the cart and leading the pony Michael O’Brien began the slow walk from the cottage up the hill towards the cemetery.

Beside the cart walked Michael O’Brien’s wife, Mary, along with his daughter Beth and his son, Sam.
Drawing up beside the open grave, Michael O’Brien and Patsy Flynn gently lifted the coffin from the cart and with the aid of ropes lowered the coffin and then the family stood silently, raising their eyes to the sky with minds on a prayer. No-one spoke, for what words might one say over a life which had only known poverty and hardship. Deprivation would find no comfort in prayers or words which might make it easier for the soul. Mary moved the children back, to watch the two men as they shoveled the soil back onto the grave, filling it to its brim and then flattening its lid with heavy blows from their shovels. Taking the rough hewn cross from the cart, Michael O’Brien used the flat of the shovel to firm the cross into the earth before loading the shovels into the back of the cart and begin the slow journey back down to the small cottage below.

Patsy Flynn solemnly shook hands with each member of the family, first with Michael O’Brien and then Mary before bending over to shake hands with Beth and then Sam. Then, not once turning to look back uphill to where he had buried the last of his family, Patsy Flynn walked away from his birthplace, never to be seen again.

Michael O’Brien lifted Beth and Sam onto the back of the cart before helping Mary up on the seat next to the driver’s seat before he took the reigns of the pony and walked slowly homewards as the sky began to cry.