Craterface

One in six homes at risk of flooding this winter

The Guardian, 2 November 2012

Early morning in my parents’ council house

with its gravelly rendering, its pimply

glass which so reminds me of frozen slugs.

Overnight the road outside has been flushed

clean away, a sewer imploding last night

beneath what had been a leaf-choked drain.

The crater is huge, like an imprint made

by a giant alien craft with one invisible

limb, lunging about in the night unseen.

Imagine the potholes where that came from!

And it could be inside the crater stalking me—

up in the blood-streaked sky I half expect

to see the earth where the moon should be.

Tonight I’ll sellotape over the mirror in case

it cracks at first sight of an alien face.

(c) 2012 Slush Poet