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Sarah Day
Easter Train
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Like
a propaganda film
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for
some revivalist sect or
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the
glossy pages of communist monthlies
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that
used to lie about home,
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rows
of moon faces beaming
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from
rice paddy and manual corn harvest -
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we
are a smiling democracy
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of
holiday train travellers;
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children
igniting at every tunnel and toot,
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parents
benign, reflective
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or
zealots, pointing and proselytising along the way,
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noisy
enthusiasm's the order of the day;
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at
critical moments, concentration's palpable
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in
sudden stillness - the crossing of a bridge,
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change
of points, shunting -
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that
back-to-the-engine abandonment
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to
the slow motion selection of the right track;
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irrepressible,
the Robert Stevenson M5
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belches
steam all the way
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and
how benign the onlookers
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who
wave and wave from roadside,
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backyard
and pasture.
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