Rescue team

Planned for days, they turned up
in their kit, with only a few hours sleep,
their dogs pulling on leads, their tools ready
and eyeing the rubble as far as they could see,
a world in ruins.

They fixed ladders, before they poked
at the crumbled walls, opened gaps
in the debris, pulled boats
down from rooftops, dug for the drowned
or killed by fallen houses and walls,
for days and days.

They built camps and supported
survivors, together they cleared roads
and walking for miles over hazardous ground, fought
out-of-control fires and took food to the people,
sack load by sack load.

The sky is tall now as over a runway and silent.
The sea has swallowed the ground, a black snake
resting on what’s shredded and eaten and wallows
on islands of mud, riding itself out into the mist,
not satisfied, still with a hunger...