Hillsborough: Remembrance

Discussion in 'Liverpool' started by liverbird, Apr 10, 2017.

  1. liverbird

    liverbird BigSoccer Supporter

    Sep 29, 2000
    Mars
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Every year as we begin this week that leads to April 15, I find myself compelled to read again and re-post, with a bit of date editing, this poem.

    When they were younger I took my son and daughters to watch football matches. My son and I went to two MLS Cup finals. I can't fully understand, but I can imagine the endless pain that the Hillsborough survivors feel.

    A schoolboy holds a leather ball
    in a photograph on a bedroom wall
    the bed is made, the curtains drawn
    as silence greets the break of dawn.

    The dusk gives way to morning light
    revealing shades of red and white
    which hang from posters locked in time
    of the Liverpool team of 89.

    Upon a pale white quilted sheet
    a football kit is folded neat
    with a yellow scarf, trimmed with red
    and some football boots beside the bed.

    In hope, the room awakes each day
    to see the boy who used to play
    but once again it wakes alone
    for this young boy’s not coming home.

    Outside, the springtime fills the air
    the smell of life is everywhere
    viola’s bloom and tulips grow
    while daffodils dance heel to toe.

    These should have been such special times
    for a boy who’d now be in his prime
    but spring forever turned to grey
    in the Yorkshire sun, one April day.

    The clock was locked on 3.06
    as sun shone down upon the pitch
    lighting up faces etched in pain
    as death descended on Leppings Lane.

    Between the bars an arm is raised
    amidst a human tidal wave
    a young hand yearning to be saved
    grows weak inside this deathly cage.

    A boy not barely in his teens
    is lost amongst the dying screams
    a body too frail to fight for breath
    is drowned below a sea of death

    His outstretched arm then disappears
    to signal 28 years of tears
    as 96 souls of those who fell
    await the toll of the justice bell.

    Ever since that disastrous day
    a vision often comes my way
    I reach and grab his outstretched arm
    then pull him up away from harm.

    We both embrace with tear-filled eyes
    I then awake to realise
    it’s the same old dream I have each week
    as I quietly cry myself to sleep.

    On April the 15th every year
    when all is calm and skies are clear
    beneath a glowing Yorkshire moon
    a lone scots piper plays a tune.

    The tune rings out the justice cause
    then blows due west across the moors
    it passes by the eternal flame
    then engulfs a young boys picture frame.

    His room is as it was that day
    for 28 years it’s stayed that way
    untouched and frozen forever in time
    since that tragic day in 89.

    And as it plays its haunting sound
    tears are heard from miles around
    they’re tears from families of those who fell
    awaiting the toll of the justice bell.
     
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  2. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Warrington (CNN)Britain's Crown Prosecution Service has confirmed that it has charged six people with criminal offenses over the 1989 Hillsborough disaster in which 96 supporters of Liverpool football club lost their lives.

    A former senior police officer, David Duckenfield, will face manslaughter charges over 95 of the 96 deaths.
    The decision, which comes 28 years after the tragedy, follows last year's inquests which found that those who died were unlawfully killed.

    http://edition.cnn.com/2017/06/28/e...ughter-charges1047AMStoryLink&linkId=39183915
     
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  3. ryered

    ryered Member+

    Jan 15, 2007
    Hill Country
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    --other--
    Another step toward justice.
     
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  4. usscouse

    usscouse BigSoccer Supporter

    May 3, 2002
    Orygun coast
  5. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    yep - posted the same in the 28 years thread
     
  6. usscouse

    usscouse BigSoccer Supporter

    May 3, 2002
    Orygun coast
    I couldn't find it. In a rush to get out. :)
     
  7. Donfather

    Donfather Member+

    Jun 1, 2015
    Club:
    Liverpool LFC
  8. zaqualung

    zaqualung Member+

    Jun 17, 2015
    San Francisco
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
  9. burning247

    burning247 Member+

    Liverpool FC
    England
    Sep 16, 2000
    Dallas
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    I'm going to ask a stupid question that I should know the answer to but why 95 counts of manslaughter and not 96?
     
  10. Donfather

    Donfather Member+

    Jun 1, 2015
    Club:
    Liverpool LFC
    The 96th person past away four years later
     
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  11. usscouse

    usscouse BigSoccer Supporter

    May 3, 2002
    Orygun coast
    I knew that but I believe he passed as a result of his injuries. So...???
     
  12. burning247

    burning247 Member+

    Liverpool FC
    England
    Sep 16, 2000
    Dallas
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Yeah, exactly. So shouldn't it be 96 counts?
     
  13. Donfather

    Donfather Member+

    Jun 1, 2015
    Club:
    Liverpool LFC
    It's a legal thing, apparently in April 1989 there was a time limit in which the death on the 96th could be linked/prosecuted

    Anthony Bland was left severely brain damaged by the crush at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield and died aged 22 in March 1993, four years after the disaster.

    At the time of his death the law prevented people from being found guilty of homicide where the death occurred more than a year and a day after injuries were inflicted.
     
  14. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Bump.
     
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  15. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Today is the 29th anniversary.
     
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  16. Red Bird

    Red Bird Member+

    Sep 30, 2003
    Oxford
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Only those who have personally been affected can truly appreciatethe horror of a state-sponsored cover-up.
     
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  17. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    This is true - but there was a whole lot of that going around England and the World back then.

    Some would say it's still going on today in different guises.
     
  18. el-capitano

    el-capitano Moderator
    Staff Member

    Aug 30, 2005
    Sydney
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Australia
  19. kopiteinkc

    kopiteinkc Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 1, 2000
    Shawnee
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Good to see so many other clubs using their social media channels to send out condolences yesterday.

    I want to say so much but cannot ....
     
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  20. burning247

    burning247 Member+

    Liverpool FC
    England
    Sep 16, 2000
    Dallas
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Didn't know where to put this (didn't like the idea of it being in the rando thread)...

    https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-50592077

     
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  21. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Terrible decision.
     
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  22. usscouse

    usscouse BigSoccer Supporter

    May 3, 2002
    Orygun coast
    It's still the old boys club.
    Only thing I can say is that it must have been weighing on his mind for all these years. Incompetent arsehole at best. Cover up artist calling dead kids drunkards and Houligans at worst.
     
  23. newterp

    newterp Moderator
    Staff Member

    Jun 6, 2007
    North Potomac, MD
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Hillsborough anniversary today.

    JFT 96
     
  24. Samarkand

    Samarkand Member+

    May 28, 2001
    A very strange Hillsborough anniversary with this worldwide lockdown, football canceled, no sports anywhere, and an odd, other-worldly feel to life.

    And yet.

    And yet, we still remember the 96. We will always remember them as long as we are Liverpool fans. Much has changed since that awful day in 1989, a modicum of justice in that the truth, the real truth, is now the accepted conventional wisdom and no one in their right mind dares question this real truth.

    And yet.

    And yet, with the exception of the Sheffield Wednesday Safety Officer, no one has been held responsible for the unlawful killing of 96 Liverpool fans. The law says they were unlawfully killed and yet no one person or persons unlawfully killed them. And odd state of affairs. It's almost as if the Establishment had to give under the weight of the compelling narrative of the day and threw the families a sop or even a paean with the unlawfully killed verdict, but then closed ranks again to protect their own, lest any one of them be held responsible.

    And yet.

    And yet, the families, the fans and all right thinking people know the truth, this real truth. They were unlawfully killed, we know who was responsible but maybe that's as far as we'll get.

    And yet.

    And yet, we know that there has not been complete justice for the 96, they still lie in that netherworld of legal limbo, vindicated but without true justice.

    And yet.

    And yet, as Liverpool fans we will remember them, we will honor them for they are us, for now and for ever.

    Justice for the 96!
     
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  25. el-capitano

    el-capitano Moderator
    Staff Member

    Aug 30, 2005
    Sydney
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Australia
    [​IMG]
     
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