Liable to Floods Owen Sheers

'Liable to floods' the farmer warned them.
And on the map, the letters arcing down the valley
in black and white
but still the major wouldn't listen

tipping back his cap with one finger
and laying a fatherly hand on the farmer's shoulder
'Don't you worry Jack,' he said,
We've got this one covered.'

And so they made their camp,
a thousand tents across the valley floor,
but even then as the GIs tapped the steel
they felt the backbone of the rock , shallow beneath the soil.

For the next two days they trained
under Moel Siabod's shoulder.
Greenhorns from Kansas, Ohio and Iowa,
sweeping in a line

through the ditches, streams and bracken,
preparing for the landings on Utah and Omaha
pegged as yet to an unknown date
hung somewhere just over the horizon.

On the third night they slept to the sound
of the rain's fusillade and the artillary of thunder,
while outside, under the cover of darkness
the river pulled herself up and spread her wings,