Thank you from Diarmada NS

We, the pupils of 4th, 5th and 6th class in Diarmada National School, Whitehall, Castlepollard, wrote this poem to thank everyone who helped us get through 2020 and the Covid-19 crisis. We had hoped to perform this for our community at our annual Christmas concert, but that has been cancelled.

We would be most grateful if you could publish this in your paper so that everyone could see how grateful we are for everything that was done for us.

Thank you, from Summer, Sarah, Sophie, Caitlin, Ciara, Aoife, Austin, Isabella, Eoghan, Hannah M, Kayla K, Cian, Jackson, Rhys, Kayla S, Ellie, Laura, Jack, Odhran, Alannah, Hannah, Teagan, Emily, Grace G, Grace O’B, Rachel, Aoife and our teacher, Ms McCabe.

Hello, how are you from Diarmada National School.

Thank you for helping us through this new kind of flu,

Now it’s our turn to bring great joy to you

And show appreciation for all that you do.

To the scientists for all your research and time

And the health workers for putting your life on the line.

To the gardaí of the country with your check-points and stops,

To the front-line people serving in shops.

To the elderly for cocooning at home

We know it was hard if you were alone.

To the farmers, businesses and factory workers,

Thank God you are not in Australia being surfers.

To all the postal and logistics for parcels galore,

All left safely outside our back door.

To the school staff for safely opening our schools.

And teaching us with all the new Covid rules.

From face masks to hand gel to keeping apart

Even if enforcing them is breaking their hearts.

To our parents who suffered as much as others,

They couldn’t visit their elderly fathers or mothers.

From home-schooling torture to losing their jobs

To running to the shops to get bits and bobs.

From early morning to late at night,

Making sure everyone else is doing alright.

When this is all over and Covid is done,

You deserve a long holiday to bask in the sun.

So what have we learned from Covid-19?

We’ve learned how kind everyone has been

We took you for granted before all of this came,

To think of it now fills us with shame.

We’re thankful for gardens, wildlife and more

In our 5km we found new places to explore.

We’ve learned to be thankful for all that we got,

Compared to others we realise we’ve a lot. We’re stronger together although we’re apart,

We thank you again from the bottom of our hearts!