Tonight

Tonight could be just another of those nights 
When the world sleeps as some lie shivering awake
under sad and forlorn neon lights
obscured by the fog passing cars make.
And in the midst of the year end's festivity
there could certainly be that whisper now
of a little conscience pricking gently
that nudges the heart to see somehow

that tonight is just another night in the cold
for some to whom this is just another date;
and if the year grows young or completely old
their gross reality it does not obfuscate.
What joy, what hope, what happiness ahead
to touch their lives when this year too is dead?

Last night when I was dropping my friend home, we noticed a group of people huddled under a flyover. The memory has haunted me all day, and, facile though it seems, I would like to dedicate my last poem of the year to all the homeless people for whom this is just another date.