My thanks to Doug Hurley for emailing me this and other poems of Brian Toomey. 


 Elegy for the Miner. 

 The miner was a man who worked underground, 
for that's the place where coal is found. 
He worked long hours in the damp, and dark, 
and all the while the black dust left it's mark. 

 He went down the pit to earn his keep, 
for his wife, and kids to have an easy sleep. 
No thought for him then, that it all might end, 
as he shoveled coal back to back with his friend. 

 The coal he dug from that deep dark pit, 
kept power stations running, and fires lit. 
Factories and ships it kept on the go, 
to him nothing it seemed could stem the flow. 

 Now from the Rhondda the pits have all gone, 
I see no longer, the miner walking along. 
All that's left are the coal tips, and the pain, 
of the blue scarred men trying to breathe again. 

 Brian Toomey.

"The Big Wheel" 

 The wheel that stands at Clydach Vale, 
tells a story, tells a tale, 
Of men who worked below the ground, 
out of sight , and out of sound. 

 Men who worked in a deep, dark hole, 
who dug out rich black seams of coal. 
Until one tragic day in May, 
when thirty one lives were taken away. 

 On the seventeenth day of May we heard, 
the siren wail to spread the word. 
Of gas that spread below, all around, 
and caused an explosion underground. 

 The mood in Clydach Vale that night, 
was of sadness, loss, pain, and fright. 
Some families would never see again, 
fathers, brothers, sons, all good men. 

 Those who escaped that terrible blast, 
will never forget their friends from the past. 
The wheel that lifted them from their fate. 
now stands as a memorial to that date. 

 Brian Toomey.

"Coal" 

 Trees died, and fell in ancient times, 
and sank below the earth. 
Long ages past, wood turned to coal, 
In seams of six foot girth. 

 Coal is black, coal is hard, 
coal is dug up from the ground. 
It must be burnt to give us warmth, 
but first it must be found. 

 Men toiled long hours below the earth, 
to find this rich black gold, 
Then bring it up into the light, 
for then it can be sold. 

 So when you feel the winters freeze, 
and by your fireside sit, 
Think on about those trees, and men, 
that keeps your fire lit. 

 Brian Toomey.