The Lusitania (Part Two)
Explosions rock the boat;
Ocean gushes inside.
The battered stern won't float,
All controls lock their slide.
Listing fifteen degrees,
The lifeboats fail to launch.
Swift decent lugs a squeeze
Impossible to staunch.
After mounting seconds
The vessel starts to slow,
While the stark deep beckons
To swallow them below.
Schweiger spies the turmoil
From aboard U-20.
Acts of rage shall embroil.
Outcomes destroy plenty.
Along the starboard side,
Crewmen sadly lose grip.
Force and terror collide--
Rag dolls plummet and flip.
The Merseyside Bowler,
Captain Bill Turner stays
As the helm controller
Until the sea betrays.
He scoops the chart and log
Before tossed by the wave
To splash down in the fog
As deck chairs bob to save.
Eighteen minutes stalk down
As the queen disappears,
This vessel of the crown
Sheds life essence like tears.
Of the forty-eight rafts,
Only six salvage lives.
Few are plucked from the craft,
Rescued before the dive.
Bodies scramble for life
As the rouge flotsam floats.
Survivors torn by strife
Wait for swift rescue boats.
The massive toll of grief
Demands a quick response.
Liars sell disbelief,
More soldiers to ensconce.
Freedom dies from deceit
Since justice needs to thrive.
Heroes wail in defeat
When covert acts contrive.
So Schweiger falls denounced
For his sinister role.
Yet U-boats do fall trounced
By the British patrol.
Bounties Cunard offers
To captains ramming foes
Offer tempting coffers
For quelling danger woes.
Poor Lusitania!
Dashed by corruptive lies.
Megalomania,
Shielding truth in disguise.
The sleeping giant stirs
Due to brutal accounts,
Sparking violent slurs
With omissive recounts.
Woodrow Wilson blusters
At the German attack
While the bankers muster
To break our nation’s back.
Indignant elites rule
Behind grim deception.
Lessons untaught in school
Show wicked inception.
Copyright © John Weber | Year Posted 2008
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