Where Did all the Children Go

Where were the whispers
In the halls, the stairs?
Questions were asked.

Children they knew,
Banished.
Grief surged

As darkness fell.
Beds were empty,
Night closed in.

A theft of friendships,
Hearts crumpled,
Then were lost in time.

Broken rooms now echo
With fear and tears.
Souls still linger,

Weeping from woodwork,
Now rotting, neglected.
Eyes still peering

Through broken window panes,
Looking for homes,
Hoping to be chosen.

Faces faded with time.
They grew, they left,
Years aged them.

Never forgotten,
Those who were lost,
Vanished without trace.

Leaving shadows of grey,
Merged into saddened walls,
Now barely standing.

If you listen
You may hear
The orphans calling.

33 Lines

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/british-orphans-it-broke-our-hearts-to-see-them-go-away-1914210.html

One August evening in 1947, nine-year-old Betty Millar (then Betty Payne) was called into the school hall of St Anthony's orphanage in Feltham, Middlesex, where she lived with 70 or so other children. Betty noticed that some of the home's young charges were puzzlingly absent. Without any preamble, the missing girls were brought in and the head of the orphanage announced these children had been picked to go and live in Australia, sailing the following day. Some of the children who had been picked had led such sheltered lives they thought Australia was a coastal resort in Britain, where they were going for a day trip.
"I shed more tears that night than I had in my short life,"