Sunday, September 11, 2011

Remembering September 11th



I wrote this poem after we went to an air show a few years after 9/11. The kids were enamored with the planes and the excitement, I was moved to tears standing in front of twisted steel beams that were traveling across America as a somber reminder of the lives lost that day.

Air Show
What my children saw –
Two twisted steel girders
one iron red
one steel silver
mounted on marble black
accented by a brass plaque.
Rubble bent and spent
nestled between a booth
selling Kettle Korn
and another hawking beer.
Poor competition for the
Thunderbirds above
shuttling through the sky 
in screaming formation.
And the toy stand beside
selling styrofoam planes
for two dollars.
What I saw –
A story told in ragged sobs
by these two wasted beams.
A tale of white faces,
hellish heat,
falling bodies;
a tome of wreckage and debris.
This humble memorial
speaks louder than the shrieks 
of the pirouetting  
fighter jets over head.
They dance for the crowd
as these ruined supports 
stand silent
at eternal attention
saluting the lost. 

3 comments:

Sarah said...

that's very moving, Nicole, thank you for sharing it

Kelly Jeanette Swift said...

A lovely poem. Thank you for sharing what you saw.

Carmen said...

Beautiful Nicole. My girls can't comprehend it I don't think... but then how can they? I still can't.