First, the plastic tractors.
Once, they raced, wheels churning excitedly over asphalt—
Down the hill,
Mounted by me and my whooping friends—
Now the tractors sit,
neglected and forlorn
In the artificial dusk
Beneath the great fir tree.
Wheels sunk into black mulch
Rancid water pooling
in their plastic seats.
Draped with cobwebs,
Like a plastic sheet.
Sitting, dead, in the great shadow
Of the fir tree,
With the rest of my childhood.
Will Hodgkinson is 16 and in the 10th grade at Waldorf High School in Massachusetts. His poetry has been published in Off the Coast, Maine’s international poetry journal, Highlights magazine, and the Arlington Advocate. His interview with Noam Chomsky was published recently in the University of Massachusetts Breakwater Review. His interests include politics and writing.
