R-Orphan Train

We're told it's for our own good
A better life to for us
So far from our family
And friends we once knew

A change of clothes
And a Bible for reading
We're boarding the Orphan Train
And soon we'll be leaving

Rolling to a countryside
So foreign to us all
We huddle close together
Trying to hide our tears

We cry out of fear
We wonder who will adopt us
The unknown is ever looming
We depart in a new place

We are forced to clean up
Try to look respectable
Paraded in front of strangers
That will be our new family

Help provide for this family
We are brought to work the fields
Some of us have better lives
Some only grateful for their meals

Late at night, with darkness all around
I hear the whistle of a locomotive
It sends shivers down my spine
I wonder who's riding on the Orphan Train tonight.

? 2001
Lisa Gibson
All Rights Reserved

I wrote this after reading some about the Orphan Trains in the late
1800's. Many of these children that were taken off the streets of New
York, went on to have better lives. However, some did not. Many were
considered a form of cheap labor for the farming families that took
them in.