9/11 - A Day of Days by Jeffrey ParrenToday is a day of days
and will always be so
as it crawls numbingly through
the ether of times.
My emotions bottled up
creep ever-so-slightly
as they build up
like stories of a tower.
Life has a way of humbling
when least expected
and, hopefully, uplifting
when most needed.
I can’t bring myself to
review the documentaries
even though Discovery
has them stuck on rerun.
Images like “The Falling Man”
are etched into my being
while videos of initial impact
offer my brain endless torment.
The day was a blur in real time
yet so concise as the years grow
and I find myself without
the right words to articulate it all.
In trying to rationalize evil,
evil thoughts resonate, echoing
a mantra so simple yet ignored:
Be good in the face of hatred.
I could ramble rhetorically
about religion and righteousness
but what good would it do?
That day cannot be undone.
We can’t get those lost souls
to miraculously come back
nor can we find the solace
from meaningless answers.
But what we can do, is revel
cautiously, in the acts of bravery
and displays of love heard
from the voices of victims.
I think back to the view from
my college dorm, with fixation
laid upon 2 pillars of a skyline
forever drawn upon my soul.
I relive the moments on a couch
feverishly calling my parents
while watching the towers plummet,
remembering that confusion.
The sights and sounds forever
will be part of our soundtracks
undeniably there, regardless
of the layers of refute we build.
Today is always the best day
to be good to one another,
to hug those closest and tell them,
even in the face of fear; “I love you.”
09/11/2019 Posted on 09/11/2019 Copyright © 2024 Jeffrey Parren
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