The Wreck

The tired child lay on her mother’s bed, worn-out from the hard day’s play,

And soon she closed her eyes and went into dreamland far away.

And by and by she saw a light come glimmering o’er the plain,

And by and by she heard it toot, and knew ‘twas a railroad train.

In her dreams she saw the headlight grow, and heard it rumble and roar;

Straight on it came, a giant of iron, to crush all that lay before.

A stream ahead and no bridge to cross! O, what could a poor child do?

If she could not reach the switch in time and steer the train safely through!

Her mother, close by, had loosened her hair, preparing to go to bed,

But she couldn’t make her mother hear, so the train still onward sped.

She roused with a scream and grabbed whate’er her little soft hand could find,

And tried to throw the train aside as it thundered through her mind.

But the train went on to its certain doom, down, down on the rocks below,

But she still held fast in her fair plump hand the lever she tried to throw.

Alas! She had done her very best to save the train from the ditch,

But the thing she grabbed was her mother’s hair, she’d been asleep at the switch!

Aug. 10, 1910