The Day the Bulldozers Came
Stanza 1
The day the bulldozers came
Rooks were building
Crazy egg baskets in the oaks;
Green flies sizzled by the pond
And a cold-eyed toad
Waited for them
The persona describes
the scene when the
bulldozers enter the
place. Rooks are building
their nests in oak trees.
Flies are buzzing as they
fly around the pond. A
toad which shows no
emotions is sitting there,
waiting to catch the flies.
The animals and insects
are unware of the danger
 Stanza 2
The day the bulldozers came
Squirrels were scattering
Up tree trunks,
And leapt from branches
That were hardly there.
The first line is a repetation,
that is when the bulldozers
arrive at that place. The
persona further describes
how squirrels dash up the
trees in different directions,
probably due to the sound
of the rumbling bulldozers.
The frightened creatures
jump from one tree branch
to another, though there are
only a few branches the left
on the trees. This is
probably because the
humans have already cut
them down.
 Stanza 3
In stanza 3, the persona
talks about a fox living in
that place. When the
The fox bulldozers arrive, the fox
Stirred in his sleep is sleeping cozily in its
As the ground trembled. burrow underground. It
‘Ha ha!’ he thought, wakes up as the ground
shakes but continues
‘I’m quite safe,
sleeping, convinced that
Deep down in the Earth, it is safe deep down in
No one can get me here.” the earth. However, the
Then the bulldozers came bulldozers start to clear
the land.