Helpless I was not
Never shall I make the mistake
Of leaning on a shoulder
To keep me sane

When I met you
There was no definitive sign
No gut feeling
Whispering “Him... him!”

It was just you and I
A couple of strangers standing
Exchanging names and numbers
A simple coffee run

I know it’s the way it should be
There doesn’t always have to be
A fairytale signal
A wordless “fate” whistled by wind

Things for us
Are calm and wonderful
Just two souls making the best
Of time so cherished
/Simplicity!/

That weekend
      I felt
Love
For my gay best friend
As he was the first person with whom I felt completely comfortable
Sharing my attraction toward a woman.
The first time I felt like a woman
And I felt like he was a man.
We laughed until sun melted into moonlight
Why would I go to prom with a straight boy?

That weekend
       I felt
Fear
Taking a serpentine system of public transportation for the first time
Getting lost in an unfamiliar state
And my parents knew about none of it.
I grew up fast that day
Swallowed my pride at the same time
Reading colorful street signs an asking strangers for directions
I met a kind bus driver who clearly felt sorry for me
Let me ride for free
And gave me his number to make sure I was safe.

That weekend
     I felt
Odd
As my best friend's church was all Asian
People looked at me a little backwards.
A mysterious boy with dark eyes was the only reason
I didn't get lost in the shuffle.
I finally felt what it was like to be a minority
And while everyone there was accepting of me
It wasn't particularly comfortable.
It was humbling for me to see
What others go through on the daily.

That weekend
    I felt
Grown
First trip on my own
Check.
Meeting my college roommate
Check.
And that same mysterious boy?
He was my tour guide
When my friend was teaching little children
About Jesus.
I wanted him to tour other things
And I fell like a brick for him
But I failed to mention
He was not just some teenage boy from a middle school dance
That's so Disney movie.
He was a man
With broad shoulders and a college education
And a faith so deep
I could only wish to swim in it.

You say you dont want to be like strangers
Yet I know nothing about you
And you know almost everything about me
You are a stranger to me
Even though it isnt what you wanted

are the lines on your wrists still glowing into the faces of the children who will never understand?
curious
they wonder
and know
you are weak

when the lights turn off in your bedroom
and the covers wrap themselves over your shoulders
around your back
you are safe, but lonely
so you drift to sleep
the lights turn on
and the groans that come from your mouth are sickening
you look sick
you sleep soundly
but the bags under your eyes get larger
packed full of regrets and things you wish you had said
truthfully, every walking animal that roams this rotten earth
is timing their clocks till their remaining days
a death that sneaks up on you without killing you
but it will squeeze your lungs
and slide it's claws through your heart
soon enough your eyes are open
your mind is awake
and people still make you angry
so much that a knife at the sides of your stomach will not fix it
and when you try to pull your finger nails off just to stop biting them
it isn't enough
no pain can reach the immensity of hate
the ghost of vengeance leads me out the gates of hell
and my hidden horns slice the necks of the ones who never took the time to stop their clocks and listen
nobody listens
to the ocean waves coming from the shells in my hair
or the cries coming from the breaking skin we call our own
or the way the cars go by without stopping to take a look outside
at the strangers walking through white snow, catching the bus just to get to a place they call home
listen to the shards and angry scissors that clamp to the fingers of little boys and girls
and the way we eat
hear the chewing of meat from the pigs that screamed
and the minds of the ones who stay quiet
f
  a
     l  
       l  
         i  
           n
              g

into a deep despair
I hide under blanket after blanket
concealing the light
now I wait
for the day
to shut off

Too many times
Had i searched for homes
Inside some strangers' collarbones

Too many times
Had i been rejected
evicted
traumatized

Too many times had i apologized
To my body
for being cruel.
as I'd found my words poor
so instead made it pour

out my crimson red life.

this is a true story about last wednesday night, STOP

i wish people would stop KNOCKING on my door at 2 am

in the morning because through those hours, i am sound asleep

and i don’t want to answer the fucken door to you

because people don’t have respect for other people

i am trying to sleep to sleep and i hear voices

of people knocking on my door trying to get in

and i don’t think people are trying to find out what i am doing

i was having voices of people saying i am easy-meat

but i am not easy-meat

i just don’t want to have strangers knocking on my door

can i have a smoke can i have a beer, and you will get high

or do you want to party, mind you i like partying, but i want to

i remember answering the door to a person in Newcastle

because he thought i was easy-meat

i don’t want to be known as easy-meat, i want to be known as strong-willed

and i was totally frightened but if i don’t answer the door

everything will be alright

if i hear the words easy-meat easy-meat, you are such easy-meat

I WILL SAY NO, i am not easy-meat and i prefer just to be treated like a man who loves life

cause i do love life, so, stop treating me like easy-meat

i prefer to help people in my own time

not at 2 in the morning, though

when i am trying to ****** sleep

and i would prefer not to be treated like easy-meat

cause i am not

In my secret life
I talk to strangers
Through words and poems

Some answer with kind thoughts
Some answer with silent thoughts

The therapy is exhilarating
In my secret life

My new friends
Give me a reason
And that reason is

*My secret life

To calculate the perfect math and succeed in society,
must we have to subtract the right to live free,
and do so privately?
Do we have to become unwrapped and molded in the warm hands of the man
that overstands but never will understand?
We are not banned to take a stand to the plan
implanted before we even began.
Do we have to learn anger before we are no longer strangers to peace?
Because I would never put a heart in danger,
but I could use a frustration release.
Do you see what I mean? -
Being torn between how they want me to be and noticing these things
that would leave my soul unclean...
I think that we should represent the unseen:
The things they don't believe reside within you and me.
The unity that could be.
The troubled hearts with the ever growing will to breathe.
The neglected souls that still, won't ever deceive.
The bewildered trees that still paint the scene.
Isn't it lovely?
Would you still love me?
If you knew you had to take off your mask,
would you still trust me?
I promise we could run free.
Follow me, we could make time move slow.
The cosmos bleed, let's reflect their glow.
We could make it so
its never our time to go.

- L.G.

all those people
do not know you

you do not
want to know them either

who wants to care
about strangers

I’m going to write you a letter.
Not now, most likely not tomorrow.
Maybe before I die, just after I get better.

See I found the problem.
The problem with me is my problem with you.
I have discovered I am the modern parasite.
I am the soul sucker.
I cling to your skin and your heart. All those little chunks--- I bite.

I know.

I was intoxicating.
I was lovely.
I was fragile.
I was broken.

You wanted to fix me.
But instead,

I broke
You.
I tore you apart and clawed out your heart.
Your eyes went glassy and your feelings fell apart.

I destroyed you.

You, You, You, You, You, You and You.
But who’s counting?


I take responsibility but I do not take blame.
I showed mercy, see.
I gave you a way out. I opened doors and offered temptation.
I warned you. I wanted you gone. I wanted you safe.
I screamed until my lungs became asphyxiated but unlike you;
I’m breathing fine.

Now we’re strangers.
Now we’re enemies.

I miss you.

But not the way you want me to.

Today is waiting
after writing a professional email
and constantly checking my inbox
getting nothing else done
and the brief relief when I see a reply
until I realize I have to do it all over again.

Today is the right classroom
with the wrong instructor at the front
and me wishing I had looked at more people before now
so maybe the faces wouldn't all look like strangers.
It's one loud girl I recognize looking as confused as I feel.
It's the "is this the right class?" "maybe" behind me.
It's the robot sitting on the desk, staring,
and unless my partner suddenly grew his hair out,
it is the stranger sitting next to me.
It's the professor entering and doubts still lingering
thirty minutes after the lecture has ended.

Today is wearing a new piece of clothing,
walking confidently out of the apartment,
and then tugging at it every thirty seconds
until the day is finally over.

Today is walking to the car at night,
hands purple in jacket pockets
gripping pepper spray in one hand
inhaler in the other
seeing the moon and stars and night sky,
and suddenly crying because the world is so small
and the universe is so big
and nothing matters
but everything matters
and what if I don't like my job
what if I live unhappily for the rest of my life
there is no reason for anything I do
why should I do anything
but I can't stop doing things
because then I won't have a stable life
and if I'm forced to live, I want to live in stability
and take care of myself and live quietly
because there's no point in changing anything
because we are all just going to die
and in the end there is no meaning to anything we do
so new clothing or wrong classrooms or writing emails shouldn't matter
but it does.

It does.

FRUITS OF MY LABOR /BASKET OF BLESSINGS  

Started with pennies gathering dandelions from here to the horizon
lincoln heads exchanged for licorice  and a bad case of sunburn......
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Soon fall will be making it's call,gently landing, billowing and lining curbs and fence rows.
For a few counted as a blessing for the neighbors and friends that would rather pay a young man to do their raking .
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Daily read is an addictive need ,getting out that fresh news is not just a muse ,so a lot of rolling held down with a rubberband ,new bike a new route , Once a month collections left me with a lot more clout.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Some farm boys born into it others just dropped at the gate,rows that grow and sunbleached blisters soon to be their fate. Bales to buck  or the need to ****  those crops that are used to feed. Piece work pay not much reason to stay.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Once only a happy thought for the new munchies that were bought ,soon those plates would be my new fate,hot wet & busy from the starting gate,regular pay & food of the day left many reasons to stay,kitchen camaraderie helping to nurture a future.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR

Boys and their shovels bonded like Lassie without getting sassie ,cooling air brings more flakes ,daily rituals measured & treasured unless they lay on a pathway or roof
piling high brings a sigh, met with manic pressure,pay increasing by the weight, gold awaits as you clear those gates.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Hurry up and wait but still stand straight,little sleep, lots to clean ,Haze grey and underway,mechanical monkeys maintain fast flyers,give it all,life or death play it out until your last breath.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR

Hard trails tell lots of tales ,mostly dollars marked by sweat, spent quick but  with little regret,Heavy metal ways marking days,calloused ,corroded smoothness eroded,
but clean , polish a few layers of paint makes for a quick sale.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Settling in, picket fence with no chagrin,time card stamped life revamped,to travail with no avail  ,endless hours all devoured ,no gain without pain gladly paying penance for our sliver of pie,Anchor & chain bring great weight, left with none when it is done.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

Started a race already ahead several steps ahead of the pace,taking it all in anything to produce a grin,rising never to find a prize,suddenly crash & burn at every turn,burning bridges missing mates, finally awakened to an open gate honesty with myself lifted all the weight.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR

Due date time to wait,no choice for pink or blue, advice in the air now even strangers seem to care,instant true love ,positive protection will be their recollection,daily reaching for the teaching to make that simple glow grow.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR  

So as we roll on all we can ask is a new dawn ,learning to live with what we gave, Hopefully blessed with lessons learned in hindsight ,may the light shine on us even at night bringing bounty to all stages of life.
FRUITS OF MY LABOR. R.C.

Sometimes I lay awake at night, rejected by everybody
Because I've been caught in moments of meaningless love
Taken in by strangers and shown a familiar world
That I know I will never rise above

What have I been waiting for?
Why can't I pack my things and leave?
You brought me here, and left me in denial
But this world was never meant for me

Sometimes I sit alone and worry
And drink away the night
The cards are dealt, but I've no hand to play
So I sit until I see the light

It's borderline illusion
A sleight-of-mind I've played on me
But it's merely self-amusement
I'm too much in love with your treachery

He keeps a flute in his boot.
Plays it for strangers, listens for little crashes of loot.
Sleeps on a stone bench near the ocean.
Sometimes he gets drunk , hollers, causes commotion.
Some days he ***** about
in his loose oversized castoff suit
looking as if he might fly
or cry when the sun shines blindness
across his two *** eyes.
Passersby know not
that once he brought the house down
with Ellington in a jazzy joint in Harlem town.

Second chances, stolen glances from the people passing by
                     me on the street. Strangers with blurred faces never stopping.
Never asking why. I’m
Taking chances, learning dances for songs that make lovers sigh.
                                 But they don’t need to know
the reasons as the changes in the seasons mean that I need to hurry.
But don’t you worry ‘cause I want to live to see the day I die.
My heart is pumping,
seriously jumping at the thought that I’m,
       that I am on my way and that beating in my chest
That‘s thumping, dangerously bumping let’s me know that I’m alive.
So I’ll take that chance, steal that glance because life is short and
While I’m here, I’ll play in the sun, and be with that one
Whose      smile      shames the brightest stars in the night’s sky
And eyes, those eyes inspire me to see all that there can be
As we.

3rd grade, 4th grade:
A sickening drop in my stomach,
My head is in the lowest gear.
I know that they live such different lives,
And yet we are connected by blood.
I can hear my pulse stop from the beat of their music,
I can feel my abdomen shrink into my spine as they yell at their mother,
I can see my hands shake even though we have the same blue eyes and same round cheeks.
I am terrified of their reality.


8th grade, 9th grade:
Strangers produce this physiological change in me:
Those with dark eyes, dark hair-
Those who are obviously different from me.
I am scared of realities I know aren't mine.


12th grade, 13th grade:
The reality I came to love is what frightens me the most.
The 4th grader within me is trembling in my palms,
She is crying in my ears,
Trying to cover up the sounds of your hiccups,
Trying to cover up the feeling of your tremors in my arms.
I trust you with my life,
But I don't trust you with your own.
I am frightened of a reality that I cannot protect.


14th grade, 15th grade:
Strength keeps me moving -
Both physical and mental.
I have carved out my own reality,
But lack an understanding of those I used to fear.
It's not in the beats of their music,
It's not in how you grind your teeth,
Or how you haunt me in my dreams.
I feel like my body is bruised -
I swear I can see the purple fade into green fade into pale skin.
I become absolutely afraid of what I still have the inability to do-
I cannot ever save anyone I feel for.
My fear is of not being a hero,
Not of you being the villain.


And sometimes
When I'm the villain,
I dream of heroes cutting me down.
I begin to believe in all-or-nothing, black-or-white justice
Where I am the only road block to a preferred reality.
So just cut me off, push me out, hit me down.
I don't want to make anyone ever feel the sickening drop
In body temperature
That has defined my idea of fear.
I don't want to be anybody's idea of failure.

I hate the summer mornings,
And walking on a path.
I hate the silent mourning
For strangers as they pass.
I hate the way that I look down
When a stranger walks past me.
I hate the way they do the same
As if there's nothing there to see.

To turn back time is pointless,
As I'd do it all again.
For I'll never know what I know now
And I know I didn't then.
The mistakes we make when we are young
We can't go back and change,
And I'm sure I'll find my early self
Just as willing to exchange.

The time for making friends has gone
And I didn't have the tools
To make good friends with anyone
When I thought they're all such fools.
But now I know that I was wrong,
I'm a bigger fool than they;
For I'm alone and work so hard
While all they do is play.

It's true to say as we grow old
We care less what others think,
But it's also true what they all say
That as we age we shrink.
Our lives become so small outside
That there's little room to breathe,
And maybe that's why I just sigh
When someone wants to leave.

It's sad to think that I thought this
And know what I know now.
That all it took was someone else
To ignore what I allow,
And step inside my silent halls,
Open curtains on the day,
And love and laugh and dance with me
And teach me how to play.

The year is 2060.

When I was a kid the future was everything. All the films about flying cars by the year 2000 and cool toys and transportation. Lightning speed teleportation. Meanwhile the world freaked out at midnight thinking this new technology would end itself because we didn’t know if the computer knew what to do after 1999. We didn’t know if they could process. That’s how dumb we were. We were afraid a computer we created wouldn’t compute that 1 + 1999 = 2000 on a digital calendar. How ugly it was that our intelligence allowed these reindeer games, and for the first time, very publicly.

It happened to all of us. All of whose parents didn’t stay together, all of us who didn’t have enough money growing up, all of us who were afraid to say anything without being yelled at, all of us who needed to feel anything after a lifetime of never knowing the world before the internet.

We stole. We stole here and there from companies that didn’t support human rights. We stole from companies that had enough money but didn’t pay their workers enough. We stole food, clothes, art supplies so we could sustain being alive before technology took that, too. It was two decades of job losses, the worst homeless crisis anyone had seen. The real aftermath of a worldwide plague.

I spent my early 20s watching people I cared about die overnight or over the years. I watched them suffer mysterious ailments.

Public shame and fear turned us into one of those trending TV shows. We always said “how could that happen?” But it did. It was gradual, that’s why we didn’t notice it.

It started with fingerprints to unlock your phone, Face ID. It started with identifying ourselves before we knew who we were. It was the left. It was the right. It was the undecided. It was the world.

Door cameras to communicate.
Online groups sharing videos and stories of strangers.
Misinformation.

America armed Israel as America had always done out of guilt for turning away the boats of Jewish families begging for help from the US before WWII.  
The world begged for a ceasefire. Russia sent submarines to Cuba and no one noticed. America put their big show on to distract the world while they silently began the process.

We were all old now. We didn’t harm anyone physically. We just needed help while our country funded wars around the world so we did what we had to while we thought the government was occupied.

Elon Musk started buying television networks after social media. That’s when it really became locked in. And more billionaires followed the same. There was nothing we could do. Years went by. More and more people forgot what things were like. Advertisements were so subtle. Paying $30 to brush our teeth with dirt after a lifetime of baking soda, fluoride, and mint oil. It was so confusing.


There aren’t many of the generation that didn’t end their own lives left but after us the suicide rates did go down. They started putting a research chemical in the water. 2-oxo-pce. Trace amounts of it did bring up people’s spirits without triggering psychosis and by the time we found out no one really cared because they felt better.  It’s weird now to think it was a good idea. Sometimes I couldn’t figure out if I just finally gave up or the water made it easier to accept life as it was.  

When they came for me that must have been why I felt I deserved it.

They had it all on camera. They created AI to scan for repeating thefts. They counted the costs. We couldn’t trust AI to ban accounts promoting hate, but we trust it to recognize faces.

It was something we worried about initially but there were so many other things to consider in the world, it honestly didn’t seem as bad in comparison.

The trials were fast.  A split second snapshot of everything you took rapidly passing a screen with a print out of your debt. It wasn’t always you in the photos, though. There was no way to argue with the algorithm. It clocked me for a Mazarati. I don’t even drive.

Of course we didn’t have the money.  It was always an insane amount,  because the technology was a barracuda and we changed so much. You just had to accept it once they showed up.

Any crime committed, if documented, can be used at any time against you. Statute of limitations no longer existed.

Disease was everywhere and they needed a way to combat it faster. No ethics in science and progress. The public was worried and we were the morally corrupt past. Justice must be served. Didn’t matter if you killed someone or you stole 10,000 diapers. I just happened to be one of the people who couldn’t afford the things I wanted.  

They poisoned us. They infected us. They killed all the people in prison before they got to us but they learned so much doing that only a fourth of us died when it was our turn.

That’s pretty impressive.  

One day I was checking the mail and it felt like a month later every political leader transferred power or position. Everything lined up perfectly for a total control of the people in what they called saving humanity. Moral superiority won but for some reason it was always against the people who needed the most help. They’d find any reason to use your body and be able to rationalize it with a nation they instilled nothing but fear and helplessness into.

You never really made contact with anyone again. You spent your life with robots checking your blood, your vitals, feeding you, bathing you, drugging you, analyzing you, and keeping you alive as long as they could so somewhere in the world the results of testing could be shared to bring hope and promise for the next generations that cures could exist and that they were fortunate for our sacrifices.

The food was good. While we were shunned for petty crimes there was a large amount of money donated to keeping us comfortable. I think it was so the public would feel less guilty.

It was catered to what would extend our lives but still flavorful. Roasted chicken, low salt, lots of herbs and hearty greens. Fruit was always ripe. Healthy amount of nuts and seeds. Cheese once a week. We had endless access to literature and the news. Best medication. Gym equipment. It was like prison but you never left your room and you were taken care of. But you didn’t have love or ***. You didn’t feel anything anymore. Maybe it’s the water talking but it was kind of nice to not think for myself in some way. Realistically they didn’t really have a choice but to keep us well managed. We were going to be the last line of subjects. They had to keep us alive, the rest of the population didn’t do anything wrong.

The only comfort that could be taken in those boxes we lived in was knowing at least we died for something after a lifetime of watching senseless death from a screen. My body was used for science. I had a purpose. I committed crimes I needed to because I lived in a terrible world. The new world was better. It was kinder. I don’t hold it against the living. They only knew what they were told.

We were survivors when we were young, but by 65-70 you were something the new world couldn’t comprehend. Lack of morals. No respect for the law. They didn’t understand it was different back then.

Social media became learning platforms. There was no discourse. No name calling. They saw what was left behind and assumed there was no explanation other than we were just bad people and corporations had been working so hard to give them a livable future and maintain a habitable earth.

My generation was to be the last one that experienced the experiments. They did eventually find a cure for everything. Depression,  every flu, blood diseases, ***** failure, cancers. They didn’t use it for profit. It’s what I always wanted. We all wanted it. We wish we had it sooner.

But the day I died, humanely euthanized, something changed. The news was on. They found water on the moon last year, raving about how pure and untouched it was, and started transporting it back, and all the people who could afford it got sick with something we’ve never known before and I realized it didn’t matter what I did or didn’t do when I was young. I deserved to try moon water before I left, not them. That was the future I was promised.

any one person can withstand pain.
But there is a subtle difference.
When it isn't registered..
Like a dream that alludes the recently awoken.
For the moment is always questioned as fiction when it comes about.
As if building a freeway over the desolation would bypass the isolated incident.
With every pass does it become so.
And yet it is ever so aparrent.
Like a splinter made of ice.
For when the initial trauma fades.
The cold.
Numb.
Aftermath.
Sets in.
Making every other impalement go unnoticed.
Picking at old scars with phantom limbs.
Visible only to other ghouls.
Which have sadly become the only contact available.
And neither the shadow nor the image it belongs to are recognizable.
And this room full of strangers gains an addition to its ever changing painting.
One that will inevitably be painted over.
For it has become not only a constant.
But a certainty.
One that will be upheld.
Regardless if this hand helps it.
Or not...

We were lovers but not quite in love
We were friends yet strangers
Till you gave me the shove

You can erase me from your life
Perhaps you can erase me from your mind
The heart will be a bit harder you will find

Probably should have known better
and maybe knew this all along
Was just hoping for love's chance
Hoping the rights would out do the wrongs

Will always hold on to us somewhere deep inside of me
So close inside so that no one can ever truly see

Yes being without you does scare me
but will keep pushing across that line
You live to play out all your silly dreams in your head
and I am just living one day at a time

Funny how a single human being can change your mood and make you feel things in one shot. And they do whatever they want- sweet talks and everything just to catch your attentions.

Foolish, I fell into his trap and then when everything seems right, he left me hanging - no words. It is like the universe stops and he turns into someone else and the next day you know, he stop talking to you. He treats you like one of his unwanted strangers.

Foolish, why did I unguarded my heart. What on earth have I done?! I should not let a dumbfounded guy just walks easily in my life and plant thorns in me.

Everything collapse. For what it is worth, I am sorry I thought someone could love me. "What is the point of loving someone if you do not love yourself?" I tell myself. Save the tears for someone worth keeping.

Warm was the early spring morning,
Cuckoos in the trees were cooing,

The sparkling sun and blue sky yearned to dance
and both did exchange shy glances,

There I was working in my yard,
The neighbour strolled by watching with eyes hard,

The fence was of wood picket made,
I stood and stretched by the garden's golden gate,

The street yet in slumber curled and yawned,
I watched the departing robes of dawn,

By the by a step gentle was heard walking by,
The sight made me with joy want to cry,

It was a young lad dressed in white
And upon his head rested a cap round and bright,

A book he lovingly cradled to his chest,
Off to a place of solitude was he, he was one blessed,

As to the ground kneeled I for the soil to prepare
Mine ears upon the air heard a rustle rare,

It was the sound of a skirt fluttering,
Patterns with flowers red all over floating,

My head did bump upon the fencing post,
My concentration vanished like a ghost,

Awkwardly I rose to my feet,
My senses sent scuttling and me flushing with heat,

We two were strangers, both unmarried,
But you did on that spring morning pause and tarry,

Our eyes locked and smiled
And you with fiery beauty my heart beguiled,

Words of greeting were sung as I dropped my garden tool,
You whispered you were late for to teach at the school,

My crippled reply remained stitched upon my lips,
My mouth frozen with love's words etched on my tongue's tip,

I imagined a feeling intense, warm and rare,
Would that I had dared to embrace and with you a kiss shared,

From my mind to spine did my body tingle
With the immense pleasure to love with you mingle,

A kiss with you upon your luscious lips scented with a rose,
O, with that glorious song I could my book of life thus close,

This and much more that lovely day I dreamed,
How long ago it now seems,

In the beating of a heartbeat
You forever disappeared down the street,

You were gone without a shadow or trace,
In my heart you left a hollow place.



©Rangzeb Hussain

This is a Christmas time request
to join in a good deed.
I’m Giving a pint at Christmastime
To strangers who are in need.

So raise your sleeve and not your glass
Don’t let blood banks run dry!
The pint you give might help one live
Who otherwise might die.

Then afterwards we’ll raise a glass,
two heroes, you and I.
We must replenish after all
And not let the well run dry.