It doesn’t take much in the area of deep recollection, but if only momentary reflection, into shadows of my own past, as I watch the eyes of yet again disappointment brandishing across the faces of these young men. Gazing out from under helmets, looking out in longing to a world that repeatedly and un-relentlessly lets them down. Hopeful faces peering out with almost longing anticipation, ever wishful that maybe this time, this one last time, the miraculous achievement may to

Another day the alarm goes off, lifting her tired, swollen eyes from the soft pillow, now a bit hard from, yet, another night of crying herself to sleep, the aches and pains of shoulders, a neck that feels like a nail has been driven down the center, greets her morning’s light of the intended gift of another day. She has to climb out of the warm lonely bed to set an aching foot onto the cold cruel floor, a tired sort of stiffness granted from the long hours of late last night