The rain was mild,
The road travelable
Until a monster
storm unleashed its rage,
The river overflowed
It’s bank with undertows
Dragging the SUV down,
as it began to float.
First responders arrived.
It took awhile.
The driver yelled for help
To save his wife and children.
Onlookers stood safe onshore,
threw ropes across the heaving waters
Until the father begged for more.
He threw a child through
the narrow window opening.
“Please help my child. Now,
please now, before he sinks.”
A raft was thrown
Which none could reach.
More calls for help,
As blankets were stacked ashore,
and life-rings propelled.
People gathered and shouted,
“How brave you are being!
How well you are doing!
We thought you would have sunk
long before.”
He called for help, more desperate now.
Asking the responders to come
into the water to save
His sons and daughters.
But, they refused with worried frowns
That they could not enter the river.
It was not allowed.
What reasoning is this?
What conscience allows
A nation to drown as we watch
Shouting the words “ How brave!”
How wondrous you stayed afloat so long.”
Stood there saluting on the bank
as the car sank.
Hoping the river’s flow
Would slow,
before all hope was lost
For those in the car
and those on the shore.
annarino writes 