This poem seems incredibly simple, especially since it is easily the shortest poem we have read this semester. However, it may be so simple that it is still very difficult. On the surface, William Carlos Williams writes about seeing a figure 5 on a fire truck, as sirens are going off. I do not understand why this is so significant. Why is the figure 5 so “Great”? Clearly there is some emergency that calls for a fire truck, but what is this emergency? I also do not understand the structure of this poem. Why is each line so short, yet there does not appear to be any pattern?