The images gripping:
The airplane that’s ripping
A rift in the tower,
The fragments that shower,
The smoke and the fire
Engulfing the spire
Until buildings descend
To a smithereen end
That snuffs out the lives
Of husbands and wives,
And fathers and mothers
And sisters and brothers,
The nephew, the niece,
Firefighters, police.
The billowing cloud,
Their particled shroud.
Others flee the smoke tide
With hurrying stride,
While still jeopardized
By shards pulverized.
They’re wearing like plaster
Debris from disaster.
No more the skyscrapers,
Just hailstorms of papers,
The tatters of lives
Where no one survives.
All gone in a minute
With no meaning in it.
And yet there is more.
From DC, our core,
The Pentagon’s hit,
One side of it split.
More jet fuel enflamed,
More lives that are claimed.
Before the smoke clears,
My eyes fill with tears.
While out in PA
There’s another replay:
A field that is scorched
By a plane that’s been torched
In an act of aggression.
A burning impression
Is all that is seen,
Until there on the screen
New York’s on the scene
For the plane to careen.
This time a new angle
The building to mangle.
Such a grisly display,
But I can’t turn away.
There’s investigation
While all of the nation
Have hearts that are reeling.
So helpless a feeling.
The faces of grief,
Tear-stained disbelief.
The country blindsided
By those so misguided.
Yet there in the rubble
Of Trade Center’s stubble
The workers remain,
Try to stifle their pain
As they strain to get footing,
Incessantly putting
Their lives into danger
To search for a stranger—
Or maybe a friend.
They work without end.
Bulldozer and crane
Work on through the rain
While newsmen retell
The stories of hell
That catch in their throats,
While the men in the coats
And helmets and boots
Earn a nation’s salutes,
And reports from ground Zero
Describe many a hero.
Survivors with tears
Tell of anger and fears,
Waving pictures of dear ones
To show all the near ones.
They tremble to cope
As they cling to each hope.
Their hopes hypnotize.
I can’t close my eyes.
The President leads
Those of various creeds
In a day full of prayer,
While in New York, the mayor
Tries to slough off the pity
And restart his city.
Though workers still strive
To find someone alive
Underneath all the rubble.
No results from their trouble.
But I see in the clutter
The stars’ and stripes’ flutter
And then like a cue,
There is red, white and blue
All over the world
As our flag is unfurled
At home and abroad.
Our hearts become awed
As the banners abound
And the air fills with sound.
“Oh say, can you see…”
And “the land of the free.”
While the words of each speech
Declare brotherhood’s reach.
A moment of silence,
A mourning alliance.
At first I’m elated
By feelings created
As candles are lighted
In a nation united.
But the remnants still smolder
And workers still shoulder
Their burdensome cross
Amid all the loss,
And smoke still arises
In ghostly disguises,
Transforming a skyline,
The terrorists byline.
Their act so deranged
Has left me quite changed.
I watch all the faces
And Ground Zero places
Where buildings are gone—
Though the TV’s not on.
The images haunted
And left me so daunted.
A feeling that thrives
Is my grief for the lives,
Those ambushed in flights,
Those perished at heights,
The responders who tried,
The loved ones who cried.
I’ll always remember
Those days that September,
When everything changed.
My thoughts rearranged,
And now every prayer
Includes folks everywhere
Whose loved ones were lost
And those who have crossed
The ocean to fight
To restore what is right.
We cannot rewind
To change humankind,
But the future of it
Remains yet unwrit.
We still can decide
Whether nations collide
Or if fighting will cease
And the world can find peace.
We have to begin
With our own friends and kin,
And try not to judge
Or harbor a grudge.
I’ll pledge you my vow
To begin here and now
To eliminate
Any feeling of Hate.
So this is my plea:
Will you join with me?
