With vacant stares and slipered feet they
shuffle aimlessly through corridors and halls-
lined with rooms with numbers on the doors.

They all have their mementos on a table
by their bed-
like faded photographs from a life
no longer led-

or standing with a wife and kids alongside
the first family car-
but now its walkers,
beds and wheel-chairs
for the men that labor no more.

Now alone and all but forgotten-
by the world they helped to build,
with strong straight backs and their
blood sweat and tears.

To these lonely soles we owe a debt,
for the legacy of freedom and prosperity
that we now possess-
and as their reward-
should not we all aid-
in their final days-
to provide them cheer and one less regret?