A WILD and lonely place
Was Glennanaffrin.
Blest with a special grace
Is Glennanaffrin:
There Holy Mass was said
In the dark days and dread,
When priests and people prayed
In Glennanaffrin.

There was no man-made church
In Glennanaffrin;
No sacristy, no porch,
In Glennanaffrin:
No roof to arch it o’er;
No windows, walls or floor;
A church without a door,
Was Glennanaffrin.

They knelt at Holy Mass
In Glennanaffrin.
On “knee-stones” on the grass,
In Glennanaffrin.
No bell called them to prayer;
No heating system there;
They came Christ’s Cross to share
In Glennanaffrin.

Those times, those crowds have gone
From Glennanaffrin.
Still the wee burn flows on
By Glennanaffrin.
For God they lived, and died.
The despot they defied,
No wonder we still pride
In Glennanaffrin.

M. O. MAOLAIN

(This was unusual to have his name signed in Irish)

Book of poems – typed by Dr. Peter Gormley – The Old Altar in Altamuskin