I find myself very effected by the news of the D.C Metro crash on the Red Line. I know people that ride that train daily. I have ridden the trains on the Orange Line. So I felt compelled to write a poem for Poetry Wednesday.
Now I lay me down to Tweet
The metro train on the red route was rolling along
Sixty miles per hour through the Maryland suburbs
Summer blooming in the country beside the track
She was texting on her Blackberry
Her life in a 140 character Tweet on Twitter.
It is possible so was the engineer like the one in LA
Totally unaware of the stopped train at the station
Disgorging weary DC workers at the end of their day
Intent upon fishing out the keys to their SUV’s
Unlocking the doors and starting the air conditioning.
In the central control room where it is programmed to prevent such things
Maybe the routing clerk spilled his coffee on the keyboard
Or was answering his cell phone
Making a note to bring home bread for dinner
Or tweeting when he should have been paying attention.
The birds sitting on the blooming Red buds
Were the only ones totally aware
Of life and living and the soon to be setting sun
As train A climbed up the back of Train B at the station
Like a horny stallion on a broodmare in his paddock.
Someone tweeted or is it twittered
‘I think we have hit something’ before they were slammed
Their Blackberries lost in the rubble on the tracks
Scores of injured tagged with green and red for emergency transport
Nine dead with black tags.
If they had known it might well be their last glimpse of earth
Would they have closed their newspapers
Shifted their attention to the here and now
To the blooming red buds laden with birds
Looked at the clouds in the sky one last time.
Would the commuter that tweeted
‘I think we might have hit something’
Want her 140 characters back for a more significant text
'Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.'
(c) Jacqui Binford-Bell
And yes there will be another multi-blog tour so leave me a message with your url.
My So-called Life has popped in with her poem by Robert Burns on Tuesday. Way to go.
Dangerous Meredith
Shouting at Street Lights
Intelliblog
http://dangerousmeredith.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteThe above link is where people can find the poem I posted - it is another medieval poem. I will also try to post it on 360 and Profiles if I have time.
The above poem is beautiful. I love the way you contrast imagery from the modern industrialised world with natural imagery. Very moving.
As always when things like this happen, I asked my husband 'how can something like this happen?' and made the usual remarks about somebody not paying attention when they should have been, human error, why was there a stationary train etc....
ReplyDeleteAnd here you are - you have put it all into a poem but not just the 'how' but the aftermath. A good read but I wish it had been a work of fiction.
Good poem, Jacqui. I, too, wonder how these things happen. When you are sitting on the train and feeling safe and unaware, as you so artfully describe, you just can't imagine such a thing happening.
ReplyDelete