Friendship

If nobody smiled and nobody cheered and nobody helped us along.
If every man looked after himself and the good things all went to the strong.
If nobody cared just a little for you and nobody thought about me
And we lived alone in the battle of life, what a dreary old world it would.

Life is sweet because of the friends we have made and the living and doing we shared.
We want to live on, not just for ourselves, but because of the people who cared.

It's living and doing for somebody else on which all life's splendor depends
and the joy of the words when you have summed them all up is in the making and keeping of friends.

This is a poem, by anonymous, that my father gave to me when I was in the second or third grade. I recited it in the play, Pandora's Box . What I just typed up is from memory, and I don't guarantee its accuracy.