GIVE ME STRENGTH

Days can be a struggle at times, feeling much alone,

Physical pain and emotional scars are hard fought.

Stress and the desire to overcome tire a body and mind,

Worries of the time keep a soul from sleep in the night.

Give me strength to make it through beyond this coming sunset,

Guide me into my day of many challenges that tear at my heart.

Wisdom would be a true gift as I try to better my life and self,

Thank you for listening as there is much hope as I stand strong.

Keith Garrett

I HAD TO HURRY

I wish I could have seen you when I called you up today,

But I was in a hurry and I had to rush away.

I had to catch a certain train to keep a special date,

And I could offer no excuse if i arrived there late.

I wish I could have been with you if only for a while,

To hold your hand, to touch your lips, and see your sunny smile.

But there will be another time when we can be alone,

And I can tell you how i long to have you for my own.

So please be patient, dearest one and put your trust in me,

And someday I shall be your own for all eternity.

I try to add up all the joys that I have known with you,

And though I add a thousand times, the count is never true.

There is no number great enough or one that could come near,

The total of the smiles that you have given me, my dear.

My every happiness is one according yo your smile,

And every smile has been an inch along my every mile.

Each little message from the heart, in every song and sign,

Has been a brighter dream for me, to keep my spirit high.

I could not stand to count them all, but every day and year,

I want you more than ever and I love you and thank you, dear.

Leon Russell Garrett

My father

FINDING FREEDOM

The search for freedom and a fight to keep it,

After thousands of years more is taken away today.

It’s all up for sale, we can barely walk in the hills anymore,

Dirt, water, and even air are not ours without a dollar.

We are not as free as we believe, we are allowed to do as they say,

All wars are not about freedom, most are of corruption and money.

Finding freedom when so much has changed is becoming rare,

We are losing it from every direction, before our eyes and behind our backs.

The enemy appears to be us, look to our neighbor more than across the sea,

Look around people, we are losing our rights, finding freedom between what is seen.

Keith Garrett

I HAD A LIFE

I sat and listened to his story, a life from this mans’ eyes,

I had a life were the words from his lips, he then went on.

Amazingly I have reached the magical one hundred years old,

This, my one hundredth Christmas will certainly be my last.

I remember some great times as a child playing in the snow,

Decorating our tree, father, mother, and sister so long ago.

Many holidays with my own children, watching their faces,

Decorating that special tree, waiting for Santa to show his face.

Christmas traditions spent with grandchildren, watching the snow,

Still, so many seasons ago, where have all the years gone, day by day away.

Great grandchildren I’ve been so fortunate to have seen, what a dream,

I had a life as I still live and breathe, a last Christmas to be, a Christmas to see.

Keith Garrett

ELLEN DOESN’T LIVE HERE ANYMORE

I think of how she liked to run through the field of flowers,

A smile so bright, as if not a care in her world, memories.

We swam in the lake, laughing under the hot Summer sun,

Walking to school on cool, Fall mornings, playing along the way.

She went away, such a sad day as my friend went far away,

I still see her running through that field with her smile so bright.

If I listen on quiet nights I hear her splashing in the water, her laugh,

I walk to school in the morning wondering if she is by my side or near,

I get tears because Ellen doesn’t live here anymore.

Keith Garrett

I DREAMED I WAS A CHILD

There was a place, there was a child, was it real, why was he crying,

A street, a neighborhood, a school where laughter lived, clowns on a wall.

Duck, duck, goose and a circle of friends, round and round they ran,

A boy named Grover, swingsets and a dream, I walk there it seems.

A small boy, lonely in his thoughts, a dreamer of things not to be thought,

Monsters under the bed, who peeks in the window above his frightened head.?

I dreamed I was a child but who is it i be, a father’s son from yesterday,

A child trapped in a place that does not let go, cartoons and sounds of planes.

Reality was but a moment, childhood innocence and magic slips away,

Where were you little girl when my October drifted into eternity.

Imagination and ice cream trucks playing musical tunes for a dime,

Warm Summer days lost in a mans child dreaming eyes.

It rests in cobwebs, it quietly waits for my return,

A place hidden from my mind, it watches, it knows what I have seen.

Keith Garrett

I CANNOT BE FOUND

You will not see me because I am not there,

Even if you search for me everywhere.

I have no touch so do not try to feel me,

I cannot be found, i’m nowhere around.

Do not try to speak with me, there’s no one to hear,

I have not a face, waste no time with a stare.

I am not there, I am not anywhere,

I am not around, therefore I cannot be found.

Keith Garrett

I CAN SEE TOMORROW

So clear to me, clear to see,

Yesterday is gone, gone away.

Today will soon be in the past,

It will be yesterday, i see this today.

Tomorrow is not yet here, this is clear,

When it comes it will turn into today,

Soon disappear into yesterday.

I can see tomorrow, I see this today,

Many things to discover, what comes my way.

What’s out on the horizon still a mystery,

It moves forward into my life, too be my today.

Keith Garrett

As he sat down in his rocking chair he began to speak,

With a smile he invited me to sit and went about his story.

His life as a child at the beginning of a war for Independence,

On a farm in South Carolina he lived with a father, brothers, sisters.

He went on to tell of adventures in the Summer just before it happened,

A big house, great times with family, working the farm each day was tiring.

He must have been about ninety years old now, the war and those days long gone,

A childhood recalled, swimming in the pond with a friend or two, the night’s moon.

He told me of this war being all around them, nothing would be the same, much change,

Tears in his eyes as he described that time and place where brothers and family died.

He sits in his chair today, many years away from there, he lives in that house today,

He sits in his chair on that porch where as a child he played, he told me of his life.

Keith Garrett

HOW FAR I’VE GONE

Far, far, I’ve made it so far, I’ve walked lost roads,

I’ve walked up hills and found they were mountains.

Went to the top, looked over the side and saw there was no bottom,

My heart has been touched then removed from within.

I’ve been told of care, shown it’s no longer there,

Said to me that I am the one, words are cheap, what to believe.

I’ve walked lost roads and found my way to where I go,

I’ve walked up hills, climbed mountains, and found the bottom.

My heart has been touched and removed but I got it back,

I’ve been told of care, shown it’s no longer there, others care.

It’s been said to me that I’m the one, now it’s done,

Words are cheap, I believe one day someone will show me.

Keith Garrett