On July the fifth, two-thousand eight,
David File approached his gate.
In Bishopstoke, a village small,
He lived alone—yet loved it all.
The flats once thrived, alive with cheer,
Now weeds and boards were all that’s here.
Seventy-two homes stood in a line,
But seventy-one were left to pine.
Graffiti marked the broken wall,
No neighbors’ footsteps in the hall.
For eight long years this block he knew,
But now the last—just him, not two.
A paper taped upon his door,
He read the words—could take no more.
An eviction note, his final call,
To leave the place he loved most of all.
He tore it down in bitter rage,
This flat his home, his treasured stage.
Atlantic Housing, cold and stern,
Had sued him once—now took their turn.
The court had ruled: you must depart,
But David clung with stubborn heart.
He swore aloud, I will not go,
And planned a protest, grim to show.
He fetched a rope, a timer, too,
A power tool—he knew what to do.
An awful trap his hands designed,
A last stand etched in tortured mind.
His parents knocked, their hearts in dread,
They phoned, they cried, but he just fled.
Inside they heard a humming tone,
A chilling, whirring, droning moan.
Police arrived, they kicked the door,
The buzzing roared, it shook the floor.
They froze in shock at what they found,
A scene too grim, without a sound.
For David’s trap was set to show,
The depths of pain he could not let go.
A chainsaw rigged upon the frame,
His life’s last act, his final claim.
The timer clicked, the blade did bite,
A ghastly end in buzzing night.
His head lay severed, still and bare,
A protest carved in brutal air.
The story spread through every town,
The nation wept, the world looked down.
Yet though his death made headlines tall,
The flats were razed, dust claimed it all.