9/11 Clouds Poem by Susan Williams
9/11 Clouds
.
clouds of angry concrete dust
born of rubble
born of ugliness
man-made thunderheads boiling and roiling
down from the skies and up into God's eyes
clouds like dark soulless monsters
billowing around the corners billowing up the streets
chasing down the survivors swallowing them up
in jet-fueled hatred and ground-up debris
a legion of darkness erupting from the depths of hell
from that churning burning perdition residing in the hearts of fallen man
blotting out the sun
in a morning eclipse in a mourning hour
burying the city in a swirling shroud of bone meal
blanketing the sidewalks in a cloak of gray ground steel
writing history in seething autumn scripts made of toxic fog and metal smog
from those churning burning clouds like dark soulless monsters
billowing around the corners billowing down the streets
chasing down the survivors swallowing them up
yet
above the blackened clouds of roiling and boiling concrete dust
white papers by the thousands
floating softly down
drifting gently down
from floor after floor of business desks
white papers descending
spiraling down on pristine wings
then uplifted and carried hither and thither on soft currents of air
perfectly surviving
above the billowing clouds moiling and coiling
perfectly surviving
above the dark thunderheads boiling and roiling
perfectly surviving
thousands of paper so thin and so delicate
so ultimately
useless
surviving
swirling white and whole and
unharmed inside the murderous clouds
paper butterflies dancing a dance of life over all this death
how can it be
that papers survive and people die
that papers fly and people plummet
.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~© by susan k williams,9/11/13
Terrorists! ! ! Wickedness of mankind on earth! Only to destroy and kill. Thanks for sharing this poem with us.
Nothing can outdo people when it comes to wickedness- -except Satan
MICHAEL WALKER- - Reply Part 2- - As so many of us did, drawn to the television set by reports of the first plane, I saw the second plane hit the tower as it happened. Watched every moment of that day, watched images over and over. Horrified, grieving, stunned... the anger didn't come for days.
Michael Walker Part Two- -The images became part of me as they did most people. The clouds, the sheets of paper, the people leaping to avoid burning to death... sometimes it feels like I've lived too long. Thank you for reading and sharing your response to that day.
A riveting memoir of September 11,2001. Tragic images of people jumping from high-rises to escape the heat, the white papers and debris that fell like a blizzard, and 'jet-fueled' hatred'. I read so many books on September 11 and they all told me something new about the mass murder, as this poem does.
Sixteen years have passed and I still remember the shock and horror of that day. I still feel that same raw sadness when anniversaries of 9/11 come round. Your powerful image of the descending office papers floating down and the last line bring home the enormity of that atrocious soulless act against humanity.
It doesn't feel like it happened 16 years ago- -feels more like three or four. I suspect that was how our parents felt about the anniversary of Pearl Harbor. Both those days make us reel and feel vulnerable and mourn so deeply for people most of us never met and atrocity keeps on wearing a new face
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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4/27/2024 2:26:46 PM # 1.0.0.1119
Susan, you write perfectly of a day that NO ONE here will ever forget...it is a permanent heart print. All of the devastation, all of the fear...all of the death....and yet amongst all of the death - and debris - papers do survive...but the people do not...the people trapped in the buildings - the people who jumped to their deaths-because they did not want to die burning up- -the people who had families-husbands, wives, children, all loves...that went to work on this day, never to see any of them again...oh, reading this makes my heart just ache for all of those who lost someone that day in New York...Washington DC and Pennsylvania. This country WILL NEVER be the same. Yesterday, in Manhatten - we had another explosion - one also earlier in the day- at the Jersey Shore....all of this just leaves us wondering as a country - what is next and when will all of this madness cease - when will all of these egregious, evil acts of violence come to an end. When will we get a firm grasp on the people, the groups, who have absolutely NO respect for human life? ? ? ? ?
I do not know if PH will print this reply- -I do not know if I can go to your site and read your poems. PH has frozen up my account and my ability to move between pages and go to my page [this time I went through address on an e-mail notifying me that there was a reader comment on my poem] nor can I go to Member Area or My Profile or post a new poem etc. I will copy this message and if it doesn't get posted I will then try to message it to you. I am beginning to wonder if I have been booted off PH- -it's been 4 or 5 days now that I have been unable to access this group in any meaningful way. So - - thank you for somehow managing to stop in and read this and comment. We Americans have been fortunate as far as undeclared attacks of war and terrorist acts when we compare our incidents to other countries. France has certainly been hit over and over lately, England has been battered a lot in the past, and so it goes in so many countries for so many reasons. The two things these acts have in common is cowardice and hatred. Bravery isn't measured by the ability to kill yourself it is measured by the ability to try to work out differences so that all can live in peace. Victims of these terrorists are all innocent of wrong-doing unless going to work is a sin in these evil people's eyes. The victims were innocent in that they weren't skulking in their neighborhoods trying to kill off the next stranger to cross their path. No, we will never be the same. We are now living in an era of ugly murderous useless creatures blowing up children, women, non-combatant men just like other countries. Who knows? Maybe this will bring our countries together in relationships that are caring, mutually supporting, and firm in its actions against evil in all its forms. In the meantime we will write to protest.. .
I do not know if PH will print this reply- -I do not know if I can go to your site and read your poems. PH has frozen up my account and my ability to move between pages and go to my page [this time I went through address on an e-mail notifying me that there was a reader comment on my poem] nor can I go to Member Area or My Profile or post a new poem etc. I will copy this message and if it doesn't get posted I will then try to message it to you. I am beginning to wonder if I have been booted off PH- -it's been 4 or 5 days now that I have been unable to access this group in any meaningful way. So - - thank you for somehow managing to stop in and read this and comment. We Americans have been fortunate as far as undeclared attacks of war and terrorist acts when we compare our incidents to other countries. France has certainly been hit over and over lately, England has been battered a lot in the past, and so it goes in so many countries for so many reasons. The two things these acts have in common is cowardice and hatred. Bravery isn't measured by the ability to kill yourself it is measured by the ability to try to work out differences so that all can live in peace. Victims of these terrorists are all innocent of wrong-doing unless going to work is a sin in these evil people's eyes. The victims were innocent in that they weren't skulking in their neighborhoods trying to kill off the next stranger to cross their path. No, we will never be the same. We are now living in an era of ugly murderous useless creatures whose joy is in bloodshed, the gorier the better. But maybe this will bind together the countries who are being attacked, maybe we peace loving nations can find a way to imprison the demons out there.