Rural Electric

- Ted Genoways

                     Bayard, Nebraska, June 1945

The workcrew worked closer, standing poles into postholes,
while the boy, not yet my father, watched at the window,

men sinking timbers, straight and tarred black as
  exclamation points

that trailed banner headlines, set boldface in inky
  newsprint

as if to conquer the silence, but soon the night house
droned like a hive, tungsten-hum and the constant buzz

of the radio's blue tubes drowning out where he was
months later when programs were interrupted for the
  news

from Japan, leaving only dim memories: years lit by
  kerosene,
days at the window watching the workcrew working,

the last innocent night by the glow of the moon,
waiting for the second the blast and flash would fill the
  room.

from: Poets Against the War, Sam Hamill, Sally Anderson, et al, ed.
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