TSUNAMI

for RB

It came out of the sky and over the tops of buildings and up

out the sewers and smashed into windows and doors. A bailiff

that swept away families, spilled into gutters, collecting their debris —

a pushchair, a repossessed car, a settee, cutlery, carpets —

ripped off the floorboards, the walls, bare concrete and broken

to fists of rubble. A rising onrush of misery; batons and helmets,

a crash of riot shields thundering inland and northwards.

Some say the levees were purposefully weakened, that sluice gates

had not undergone the mandatory checks, flood defence budgets

were cut. Four years of waters continuing to rise, it's swim or die

or be eaten by the sharks, contract dysentery or starve or buy a speedboat.