As The Dust Settles

This one was based on an unsavory accident in 1997 when the ACT government demolished the old hospital on the edge of Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra. Thousands lined the lakeside to watch but the explosives were incorrectly set and flying debris littered the lake, reached the far shore and killed one poor little girl. Sad, very sad.

As The Dust Settles

As the dust settles

media moths migrate 

en masse, 

attracted from the capitol, 

wild accusations 

like shrapnel fly, 

imploding the myth 

of Sunday by the shore, 

lake’s shores 

safe shores 

Lake Burley Grieving, 

ask whose is the shame, 

ask whose is the blame?

As the dust settles

back peddling 

politicians nit pick 

the community picnic, 

conceived of 

mass marketers 

now counting 

their electoral cost; 

old union heads, 

after the event, 

wax wise in lament 

of such cost effective, 

but non traditional 

solutions; oh yes, 

and dangerous too.

As the dust settles 

over the shattered 

sanatorium, 

once life’s savior 

now turned harbinger of death 

in its own deck of cards 

demolition demise, 

keen sighted 

legal eagles 

hover above the carrion 

that was Canberra’s child, 

but the dead 

will not arise 

from class actions, 

even on the third day.