There are not many leaves. There was no time for trees When Picher was born. But now there are small trees That make a little shade. The children play in the dust The mellow, hot, hot dust Along the broken sidewalks. The houses squat low on the ground. The houses stare, and hug a tailing pile. The children run up and down And over and across -- (And -- occasionally -- @3one is drowned@1 in the mill ponds left unguarded); The husbands come wearily home With an empty battered dinner bucket In one hand And a powder box in the other. When the sun stares around a rock pile Across the pond -- They come wearily home in the evening. The children run barefoot to meet them; The fathers are as tall as the trees And they as the trees Bend wearily above the earth. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...DUSK IN WAR TIME by SARA TEASDALE WRITTEN FOR MY SON, AND SPOKEN BY HIM AT HIS FIRST PUTTING ON BREECHES by MARY BARBER A BORDER AFFAIR by CHARLES BADGER CLARK JR. PICTURES FROM APPLEDORE: 3 by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL ODES: BOOK 2: ODE 15. ON DOMESTIC MANNERS (UNFINISHED) by MARK AKENSIDE TWO SONNETS FROM NEW YORK: TOWERS by ADELAIDE NICHOLS BAKER TO DR. PRIESTLEY. DEC. 29, 1792 by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD |