On July the fifth, two-thousand eight,David File approached his gate.In Bishopstoke, a village small,He lived alone—yet loved it all. The flats once thrived, alive with cheer,Now weeds and boards were all that’s here.Seventy-two homes stood in a line,But seventy-one were left to pine. Graffiti marked the broken wall,No neighbors’ footsteps in the hall.For eight long […]

One summer night in nineteen-oh-four’s glow,Anna Gray lay restless, soft and low.In a second-floor room at a B & B,her stomach churned from a mince-pie spree. The air was heavy, stale as old tin,no breeze to soothe the ache within.She tossed the quilt, she heaved a sigh,and at the sash she opened the sky. Fresh

In Edinburgh’s ward back in seventeen eighty-five,A woman lay writhing, barely alive.The Royal Infirmary, grand in its might,Yet her chamber was small, bare, and stark white. She clutched at the bed, her cries filled the air,Sweat poured down her face, despair everywhere.The nurses encircled, unsure what to do,For hours she labored, but progress was few.

At two in the morning, December’s cold air,Old Henry Hall climbed the lighthouse stair.Ninety-four years, yet steady and strong,Keeping the light, as he had all along. His comrades lay drunk, in slumber so deep,While Henry alone the night watch did keep.No modern bulbs, no wires in sight,Just candles aflame to guide ships by night. He

At 11:40 on a late autumn day,Chief Jack Schoffall parked his truck by the hay.Beside him was Donald, his trusted right hand,They’d come to assist on this rural farm land. The farmer named Jeffrey was waving with fear,Pointing behind him: “The danger is here!”A thin stream of smoke from a tall barn did rise,A problem

At ten o’clock on a September night,Two divers crawled in desperate fright.Roger, twenty-four, and Peter near thirty,Hands and knees scraped, rushing, dirty. Their home was no flat, no city floor,But a metal box with a watertight door.Two hundred miles from Scotland’s land,Beneath the sea, where oil rigs stand. Pressures deep and gases mixed,Rules of life

At seven sharp, that autumn night,Young Frederick took his maiden flight.From Melbourne’s glow, he soared away,Toward King Island, across the bay. A dreamer’s heart within his chest,To be a pilot was his quest.Though Air Force doors had closed him out,His father’s wealth erased the doubt. The Bass Strait stretched, a darkened sea,A void of night,

On an August morn in twenty-eighteen,Vladimir stepped where few had been.A taxi left him on a road so bare,The Alaskan wild—no soul lived there. With phone and charger, oatmeal too,A backpack stuffed with clothes he knew.The driver asked, “Are you sure, my friend?”Vlad only smiled, “God will defend.” His family begged, “Don’t take this quest,Bring

At 8:30 p.m., August twentieth, ‘10,An old man named Jong took a walk once again.Through New Taipei’s streets, he strolled in the night,Returning to his daughter’s place, warm and bright. Outside stood a lamp with a poster displayed,A missing woman’s picture, her smile had decayed.Her name was Chen Yanqui, from the very same place,A patient

One spring in Taiwan, back in ’59,A man named Wu biked through sunshine.A civil engineer, strong and spry,But this day his speed was do-or-die. His wife had fallen dreadfully ill,He raced the road, heart iron-willed.Yet strangely heavy his cycle became,As though unseen weight had joined his frame. Neighbors he passed with polite little waves,But scowls