04-09-2014, 05:06 AM
Nothing Learned
During grade school fire drills we'd escape
into the fresh air, enjoying the break.
For one bomb drill we'd line the hall walls,
the youngest tossing beanbags
while the older kids whispered
in fun; for the other we'd crouch
under our desks, sneaking peeks
out the window, silently imagining
our own personal terrors.
I always wondered how I'd find
my family, wandering
a changed landscape.
Forty years later,
when our world shook and solidity
collapsed in on itself, only smoke
rose where the towers had stood, the dead
still uncounted, survivors emerging.
Unable to return home,
I drove through streets buried
under soot and computer debris,
aiming for mom and dad's.
During grade school fire drills we'd escape
into the fresh air, enjoying the break.
For one bomb drill we'd line the hall walls,
the youngest tossing beanbags
while the older kids whispered
in fun; for the other we'd crouch
under our desks, sneaking peeks
out the window, silently imagining
our own personal terrors.
I always wondered how I'd find
my family, wandering
a changed landscape.
Forty years later,
when our world shook and solidity
collapsed in on itself, only smoke
rose where the towers had stood, the dead
still uncounted, survivors emerging.
Unable to return home,
I drove through streets buried
under soot and computer debris,
aiming for mom and dad's.
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