Hi Shah,
I like what this poem is doing! Each of the characters you describe gives me
a different image and the line: "the engine moves in one direction only" is
a neat way of saying something about their lives (and about all our lives!).
Perhaps, like Christina, I wondered just how you knew all the details you
mention (you'd probably only know these things if you'd talked to them, knew
them, listened to them)...
So, as one suggestion, could you not put some of the characters in the past
tense (and put them on the train, let them get on one by one perhaps?) so
they all watch the person struggling to get on? That might work, but it
might mean changing some of the facts. And would that mean the poet is on
the train!
Or you might make the point that the poet is waiting to get on board the
train, too... (and then the poet is part of the queue).
I sort of feel I want to know that the writer4 is involved with these people
in some way. Then I can feel more involvement too.
I don't know where the poet is!
As a story poem, a narrative poem, it's a good un!
Bob
>From: c s shah <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: NEW: The train on the move
>Date: Sat, 19 Apr 2003 12:20:59 +0530
>
>The train on the move
>
>With effort the huge load jerks ahead
>emitting some puffs of black smoke.
>The crows on a pole flutter for a while
>but settle down again- crowing inwardly:
>the engine moves in one direction always.
>The girl, on her first visit to grandpa,
>bends over the window and claps in joy;
>the mother, as is her wont, pulls her back.
>A pensive wife, forced to maternity leave,
>waves timidly to her man, as he looks at
>the slow movement of platform clock.
>A student is anxious, repeatedly looks
>at the papers; the certificates he hopes
>are worth their weight to secure him a job.
>An old man is wheeled to the compartment,
>he has a broken hip- slipped in the bath.
>Some say he broke his bone first and then
>had the nasty fall. The door of the bogie
>gets jammed and the wheelchair gets stuck.
>The guard blows his whistle and the porter
>is in a fix; the jerk might induce another fall.
>The old man manages to jump* inside as
>the wheelchair drops on the platform.
>The crowd heaves a sigh of relief,
>even as another bone cracks in his arm.
>--
>
>c s shah
>
>[*wriggle]
>I have deliberately used the word "jump" here,
>for in the situation of life and death, even
>a person with broken hip might "jump" to safety.
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