The life of a language arts teacher

In the life of a language arts teacher (who also teaches social studies) you find yourself in some unusual/unique situations.  Today I found myself writing a poem from the perspective of an Asian Immigrant during the period of Westward Expansion to give them an example of what I wanted for a poetry response assignment.  (The assignment was to illustrate the emotion of a person from a list of people groups during this time period and how they felt about westward expansion.)   Just for laughs, I'll share it here. This was written in the space of about 5 minutes, so don't read too carefully or critically ;-).

The Strike

Across the wide blue deep

In search of gold I seek

Sailing ever, ever on

To strike it rich, this is my song

Toil and trouble, trouble and toil

How my world has changed

My attempt to find gold, it was foiled

Now I'm on the range.

Across the wide green plain

A railroad track is gained

Pounding ever, ever on

To strike a nail, this my new song

Toil and trouble, trouble and toil

How my world has changed

Part of the machine, each cog well oiled

My life now seems so strange.