How Can You Leave Your Past Behind Poem by Francis Duggan

It was on a bleak December a cold and wintery day
And the fields around the old home were looking frosty gray
And darkening clouds in sunless sky told sleet or rain was near
And i said farewell to Millstreet and places i loved dear.

A drive from Charlie Cooper to square in Millstreet town
I did not tell him of my plans i felt so sad and down
I had given the false image of this macho man for years
How could i say goodbye to him and risk the parting tears.

To migrate in your fortieth year to some might seem quite strange
But my life had been going nowhere I had this need for change
For years i kept telling myself what's here for you to stay?
Till i left my past behind me and i travelled far away.

Till i left my past behind me to my own self i lie
How can you leave your past behind if you can't say goodbye?
The goodbyes were not spoken the home fields i still see
I left my past behind me but did my past leave me? .

I envy those who stay at home and live at their own pace
With no desire to travel far content in their home place
They live their lives in their home place to travel not inclined
I envy them their sense of belonging the happy settled kind.

This wanderlust is like a drug it's a form of disease
It makes you want to travel more it's crave you can't appease
'Oh' lucky happy stay at home whom wanderlust passed by
For those who have the 'travel bug' must wander till they die.

Searching for slugs and worms on the frost hardened ground
The blackbird scratched by hedgerow and scattered leaves around
And darkening clouds were gathering above old Clara hill
As i bade farewell to Millstreet in Bleak December's chill.

I called to Kathy Driscoll to pay my bus and ferry fare
And spoke to John 'Fox' O Connor at Millstreet's old Town Square
But i did not tell him of my plans and he seemed unaware
That i was leaving Ireland that evening from Rosslare.

A drive from Charlie Cooper to square in Millstreet Town
But i did not tell him of my plans i felt so sad and down
And i left my past behind me but to myself i lie
For how can you leave your past behind if you can't say goodbye?