Power

This is one of the first poems I give my students each year when we study poetry. It is simple to understand, but has an incredibly powerful message.

Power

No one we knew had ever stopped a train

Hardly daring to breathe, I waited

Belly-down with my brother

In a dry ditch

Watching through the green thickness

Of grass and willows.

Stuffed with crumpled newspapers,

The shirt and pants looked real enough

Stretched out across the rails. I felt my heart

Beating against the cool ground

And the terrible long screech of the train’s

Braking began. We had done it.

Then it was in front of us –

A hundred iron wheels tearing like time

Into red flannel and denim, shredding the child

We had made – until it finally stopped.

My brother jabbed at me,

Pointed down the tracks. A man

Had climbed out of the engine, was running,

In our direction, waving his arms,

Screaming that he would kill us –

Whoever we were.

Then, very close to the spot

Where we hid, he stomped and cursed

At the rags and papers scattered

Over the gravel from our joke.

I tried to remember which of us

That red shirt had belonged to,

But morning seemed too long ago, and the man

Was falling, sobbing, to his knees.

I couldn’t stop watching.

My brother lay next to me,

His hands covering his ears,

His face pressed tight to the ground.

-Corrine Hales

When they finish reading it, I always ask - how many children died or lost their childhood?