3.
Two fighter jets flew overhead
as a pink-white cloud rose to greet them.
Too late,
it was time to go, evacuate,
no more to do but escape.
I walk in a surreal haze
across Brooklyn Bridge choking
on my survivor’s guilt
already welling on selfish phlegm
coughed up with pieces of them,
those sacrificed in that hour
Tower after Tower...
4.
My memory of that day is packed
into an office-like room...
On fire
in a state of constant collapse.
Contents float out of shattered windows
upon smoke, and fume
up into a deep blue September sky...
that space
in my mind
is always the 11th day of the 9th month
of 2001
8:46am or 3:43pm on a day
that never ends, that always ends...
the same way
falling slow motion
silent.
