‘Tony Gill– Street Poet’ is a book produced by Thomas Crilly, the Chairperson of the ‘Ringsend & District Response to Drugs’. It is a collection of the poems of the late Tony Gill, a homeless man from the Quays who died after being set alight by another homeless man.

This book gives an insight into the mind of a homeless man and shows us the human side behind the scruffy, dishevelled exterior. A number of Tony’s poems highlight the loneliness of being homeless (‘Today I spoke to no one and nobody spoke to me. Am I dead?’) and his struggle to be seen as an equal- ‘Don’t look at me with a frown, don’t look down’.

We are also given a brief history of Tony’s life, from his upbringing in the drinking culture on the quays to the point following the death of his mother where his life collapsed into total chaos and homelessness.

It shows us he was not a stereotypical homeless man and was very well-read and intelligent. In another lifetime he might have been a respected member of the artistic community.

There is one lovely story which gives us an insight into his humanity where Tony buys a Christmas present for a nurse because he “just wanted to give her something.”

I met up recently with Thomas Crilly and he told me about his aims for the book and about the Spellman Centre.

Thomas said that there is a large problem with alcohol among young people and that there are mixed messages being sent when parents spend seven nights in the pub and then tell their children not to drink.

The aim of the Spellman Centre is to get eight or nine heroin addicts a year drug-free, which it has done successfully. It also provides support groups, one-to-one counselling sessions and family support, which is very important to help repair the ties and rebuild the trust that has been eroded by years of drug abuse.

It also helps to provide re-integration into the community for the addicts through people from the community coming in to demonstrate activities such as arts and crafts.

Thomas Crilly told me that people from the community wanted something done to help the young people on drugs but were fearful of having the centre in the area because of fear of crime from the addicts attending the centre. This fear is largely misplaced because most of them are there for help and to turn their lives around.

This centre does a lot of excellent work in the community, such as helping young people to rebuild their lives and give them a chance where otherwise they might have ended up in prison or dead.

Many of the former addicts have gone on to become productive members of society and to lead normal lives. It is a brilliant achievement to overcome addiction and these young people deserve our admiration and respect.