story484.xml
Title
story484.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2002-05-01
911DA Story: Story
A DIFFERENT WORLD
No concrete Barricades around
the White House or Sears Tower when I qrew up.
No one feared the delivery of mail.
My qrandchildren in Israel know only
Roll-down metal windows in their house,
A bomb shelter room equipped with gas masks,
their car windows - rock-proof plastic.
This Hitler of 2001 scares most of America,
much of the Western world. Does he taint our mail?
Osama aims to purify the earth of infidels
Walking in botanic gardens I hear military planes howl.
Will jets ever sound innocent again?
Osama has bulged our defense budgets,
coiled the world economy.
I want to run from New York City
yet be near museums, poetry workshops,
expansive parks, not too far from family.
Osama's new Jonestown hosts a population
in the millions. New York Times photos and captions
form goose pimples on my skin, a fist of hate and fear
inside my chest. Rehima holds and kisses her 3-year-old Osama
and says, In the name of God, I will sacrifice my son. . .
for all my six sons, I wanted them to be mujahadeen. . . .
Jihad is when you are attacked, you attack back.
This is God's wish. Shafia Salaam says, Non-muslims are
our enemy according to the Koran, so Americans are our enemy.
My friend, Anne Frank's age, relives her years of hiding
in attics and haystacks. Sonny says, "Till Arab mother's love
their sons enough they'll always be threats."
Now America's grown into a land of targets:
the White Kouse, the New York Stock Exchange,
nuclear power plants. As the Taliban desecrated
Buddhist shrines, will they now seek to fell our sequoias,
our Golden Gate and Brooklyn Bridges, the U.N.,
our Lady of the Harbor?
Since the 1993 Twin Tower attack the USA has ostriched
its stalwart self ito a sense of the almighty.
We forgot, a squadron of mosquitoes can cause toxicity
and death. How can we plug the matrix
of Freedom's screens, now big enough
to let horse flies in?
When God is invoked I know it's time to hide.
My flag is on display, my ears alert,
yet my dreams are strafed. Fear and anger creep
between morning glories, marigolds,
and Mozart's notes as skies roar
with F16's not heard before
terrorists converted three of our planes
to bombs. We cannot hide from those who have
mere scraps of food and live
in torn tents or shacks,
whose pain and want can be honed to wrath,
missiles against the wealthy.
This poem was read at the National Poetry Month @ The Writer's Voice of the West Side Y: After 9/11, Curated by Jane Herschlag. April 10th, Writer's Voice, 5 West 63rd, New York, NY
No concrete Barricades around
the White House or Sears Tower when I qrew up.
No one feared the delivery of mail.
My qrandchildren in Israel know only
Roll-down metal windows in their house,
A bomb shelter room equipped with gas masks,
their car windows - rock-proof plastic.
This Hitler of 2001 scares most of America,
much of the Western world. Does he taint our mail?
Osama aims to purify the earth of infidels
Walking in botanic gardens I hear military planes howl.
Will jets ever sound innocent again?
Osama has bulged our defense budgets,
coiled the world economy.
I want to run from New York City
yet be near museums, poetry workshops,
expansive parks, not too far from family.
Osama's new Jonestown hosts a population
in the millions. New York Times photos and captions
form goose pimples on my skin, a fist of hate and fear
inside my chest. Rehima holds and kisses her 3-year-old Osama
and says, In the name of God, I will sacrifice my son. . .
for all my six sons, I wanted them to be mujahadeen. . . .
Jihad is when you are attacked, you attack back.
This is God's wish. Shafia Salaam says, Non-muslims are
our enemy according to the Koran, so Americans are our enemy.
My friend, Anne Frank's age, relives her years of hiding
in attics and haystacks. Sonny says, "Till Arab mother's love
their sons enough they'll always be threats."
Now America's grown into a land of targets:
the White Kouse, the New York Stock Exchange,
nuclear power plants. As the Taliban desecrated
Buddhist shrines, will they now seek to fell our sequoias,
our Golden Gate and Brooklyn Bridges, the U.N.,
our Lady of the Harbor?
Since the 1993 Twin Tower attack the USA has ostriched
its stalwart self ito a sense of the almighty.
We forgot, a squadron of mosquitoes can cause toxicity
and death. How can we plug the matrix
of Freedom's screens, now big enough
to let horse flies in?
When God is invoked I know it's time to hide.
My flag is on display, my ears alert,
yet my dreams are strafed. Fear and anger creep
between morning glories, marigolds,
and Mozart's notes as skies roar
with F16's not heard before
terrorists converted three of our planes
to bombs. We cannot hide from those who have
mere scraps of food and live
in torn tents or shacks,
whose pain and want can be honed to wrath,
missiles against the wealthy.
This poem was read at the National Poetry Month @ The Writer's Voice of the West Side Y: After 9/11, Curated by Jane Herschlag. April 10th, Writer's Voice, 5 West 63rd, New York, NY
Collection
Citation
“story484.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed January 4, 2025, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/14391.