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SILENCE (OVER MANHATTAN)
by Paula Bardell
A black September shadow cloaks the dawn,
The City's once white teeth now rotting stumps,
Midst choking dusty embers ether-borne,
Its shrunken soundless heart now barely pumps.[1]
Infernos upon retribution rise,
Fanaticism maddening the flames,
Its once imposing deities abscise,
As the faceless antagonist proclaims:[2]
A consummation sweet but unfulfilled,
A penetrative burst without regret,
A zealous passion never to be stilled,
An earthly instinct powerful, and yet -
This bitter loathing blowing from the East,
Curtailed but could not kill the feisty beast.[3]
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[1] RUINS
by Dorothea Grossman
A year later, I'm still seeing
chalk and charcoal,
and all those diagonals,
fighting like mad to stand up
on that carpet of skin and bones.
[2] "Garments of fire shall be cut
and there shall be poured over their heads boiling water,
whereby whatsoever is in their bellies
and their skins shall be melted..." -- THE KORAN
[3] GROUND ZERO
It's Twenty Eleven
As a numb nonentity
Subsists on difficulties
Swept up to eternity.
We succumb to a succubus,
We twitch in a cement tomb.
Bottom tenement traps;
Subway plans infinitum.
Pottle of suspects,
Scuttlebutt of slime;
Rest in pieces
One spirit at a time.
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