The Train Engineer (March 1983) Poem by Steven S. Walsky

He said he was once in the Army,
a paratrooper to be exact.
Had served with the American Second Division,
'the ones with the Indian head patch.'

On his engineer's coat he wore a pin,
airborne wings in gold.
A reminder of the Korean nights,
driving an ambulance in foreign cold.

A volunteer with the United Nations,
on 'Stinky Hill, ' he said.
'It got its name from the rotting bodies;
too many Turk and Korean dead.'

Now he is an engineer;
a commuter train on tracks of steel.
But he remembers thirty some years past;
he remembers how cold you could feel.

He stopped to talk to an American,
to blow the train horn for a little boy.
For him, he could tell his story;
for me, he brought my son some joy.


(Copyright Steven S. Walsky 1983.)