Firouz Hejazi

We grow up in our local community

Every day we pass each other’s way

Walking casual and cautiously;

“Haya doin man ?”

“Hanging in man, hanging in”

We are aware of our each other’s affair

Also the time one of us has spent

There; with White - Jackets people

Or, in behind, the familiar, bar

We live together, in a group shelter

Do we have any other choices?

Often we try to beat the system;

By doing less, and asking more

We too, fall in love

When our carts are piled up

With junk, and a lot of canned food

And, if the bottle is still half full

Then a secret dream shall occupy

Our confused beating heads

A colorful, rapturous dream;

It is a lottery dream

So, we don’t feel the traffic flow

Even so close as we are sitting

On the bench inside the bus-station

The authorities and the people

We should thank

They built a lot of bus-stations for us

And made themselves easy

To know where we are with our minds

And when the time comes for leaving

They just stop by the curb.


Soon after it seems that the bench

Was never occupied by a man

Down there was living for a while.