OF DROUGHT AND FLOODING RAIN           For several years this Queensland   Was gripped by widespread drought   As one by one our storage dams   All gradually dried out.   Now Joseph long ago explained   Pharaoh's most perplexing dreams   That weather runs in cycles   Seven yearly, so it seems!   Still every season cyclones   Are tracked along our shore   The weathermen keep us aware   Of what might lie in store   And Brisbane folk will often tell   Of what happened once before   When Cyclone Wanda funnelled down   And settled at our door.   The River City flooded   An unprecedented sight   In a magnitude unbounded   Water reached a record height   And so they built the Wivenhoe   A flood mitigation dam   To flood proof greater Brisbane -   At least - That was their plan!   But nature won't be thwarted   By the meagre mind of man   To think, perhaps, we ever might   Maintain the upper hand.   So for years we blamed El Nino   For those endless sunburned days   Until the southern oscillation turned   To the farmers loud Ole's.	2                                      At last, now all predicted   For seven years, refreshing rain   To nourish a parched, now arid land   To compensate past pain.   Alas! - La Nina strengthened   A vast monsoonal trough   And almost unexpected   Demonstrated Nature's wrath.   For forty days and forty nights   It seemed the rain fell down   Across the breadth of Queensland   Flooded many a country town.   The Water Board, undecided   Were clearly in some doubt   On the catchment there, at Wivenhoe   Should they let more water out?   Trouble first was manifest   At Toowoomba, perched on its Range   When a cloudburst opened overhead   From the drought, a poor exchange.   The drains and City watercourse   With the deluge, could not cope   Confined within the urban lines   It welled on up the slope.   The muddy torrent thundered down   The quiet suburban streets   Collecting cars and debris   Anything that it should meet   All piled up at the corners   Ground up by the violent flow   And for anyone who wondered   Where would all this water go?	3                          The turgid foaming water fell   Unrelenting, on its downward path   Smashed through the town of Withcott -   You've seen the aftermath!   The folk had little warning   Before shelter they could seek   It surged over the escarpment   And raged down Murphy's Creek.   Down the Lockyer Valley   Grantham soon bore the brunt   Of the wave of sullied waters   That spread wide a fearsome front.   Some scrambled onto rooftops   And stayed both night and day   While many houses in its path   Were cruelly swept away.   The rain fell unabated   Across the hills and Brisbane plain   And the plans to flood proof Brisbane   Appeared to be in vain.   The flood gates of Great Wivenhoe   Were by now all opened wide   A new torrent boiled its way downstream   To join the swelling tide.   The creeks and river systems   Had long since burst their banks   And flowed first into Ipswich   Through suburban lower ranks.   It reached the Civic Centre   As the murky water pulsed   And in our oldest city   All low buildings were engulfed.	4                                 The populace of Brisbane now   In lower reaches were resigned   For an inundation even higher   Now a peak had been defined.   There is no further need though   For these scenes to be relayed   As every television channel   Sent them graphically displayed.   So all the World bore witness   To Brisbane's darkest hour   So much was slowly swallowed   By the River's swollen power.   The flood has since subsided   And the threat, for now, has passed   Bitter memories and the heartache, though   We know for years will last.   Queensland must now recover   And face the huge financial cost   A consideration unbecoming   In the light of many lives they lost   And those who mourn their loved ones   Leave a tribute and remain   To pass a benediction   For now to ease their pain.   Throughout the reconstruction   Plan well, that we might gain   Some insight from harsh lessons   So they might not have died in vain.   For be not disillusioned   It could happen all again  Through our Country's endless cycle   Of drought and flooding rain.       ©  Rodd Sherwin
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