story259.xml
Title
story259.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2002-03-16
911DA Story: Story
I can't explain my experience of watching everything occur on CNN while watching TVin a hotel room between jobs, while waiting for my new work visa to be approved.
For weeks after wards I didn't sleep. Five five days I did not sleep at all. I lost friends in the WTC. I used to deliver baked goods at just about 8:45 every AM when I was at the ZCNY Greystone Bakery.
One day, while driving up the New Jersey Turnpike, many years before, 30 or 40 years ago, I saw the WTC on the horizon and while studying it, I had a profound insight into how a building means and all the buildings I ever really loved, from the Parthenon to Frank LLoyd Wright's work in PA or Tokyo, or the cathedral in Toledo where Goya worked, or Swiss chalets where I played as a kid all came together in a new way, and now that WTC was gone.
I had to say what it all meant to me including the love I have for New York and sacredness of the land in which in resides and which takes care of us, unbidden and unrequited but loyal and full of compassion.
I wrote this poem, a series of linked haiku, to express my experiences:
hokku 11/9/2001
autumn in New York
trees and fields in full color
acrid scents of smoke
New York in autumn
rainbows riot through the hills
scents of smoke linger
from mountains to seas
flows a majestic Hudson
past the great city
twin towers of steel
shimmering in sunlight
standing tall always
out of twisted steel
from that terrible furnace
they forge us new hope
I don't think the teers will ever really ever stop, but without tears how can we ever know our real humanity.
For weeks after wards I didn't sleep. Five five days I did not sleep at all. I lost friends in the WTC. I used to deliver baked goods at just about 8:45 every AM when I was at the ZCNY Greystone Bakery.
One day, while driving up the New Jersey Turnpike, many years before, 30 or 40 years ago, I saw the WTC on the horizon and while studying it, I had a profound insight into how a building means and all the buildings I ever really loved, from the Parthenon to Frank LLoyd Wright's work in PA or Tokyo, or the cathedral in Toledo where Goya worked, or Swiss chalets where I played as a kid all came together in a new way, and now that WTC was gone.
I had to say what it all meant to me including the love I have for New York and sacredness of the land in which in resides and which takes care of us, unbidden and unrequited but loyal and full of compassion.
I wrote this poem, a series of linked haiku, to express my experiences:
hokku 11/9/2001
autumn in New York
trees and fields in full color
acrid scents of smoke
New York in autumn
rainbows riot through the hills
scents of smoke linger
from mountains to seas
flows a majestic Hudson
past the great city
twin towers of steel
shimmering in sunlight
standing tall always
out of twisted steel
from that terrible furnace
they forge us new hope
I don't think the teers will ever really ever stop, but without tears how can we ever know our real humanity.
Collection
Citation
“story259.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed January 15, 2025, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/14195.