Towers – An interlude

On the evening of the fall of the Twin Towers in NYC, September 11, 2001, I sat down to write – completing the following verses some nine days later.  The final six lines, with heavy religious and patriotic undertones, have at times been published separately.

Towers

With towering fury, the devil let go,
and the walls came a tumblin’ down;
The sun burned red and the sky festered black,
as the air choked the very soul
    with a stifled gasp, a shriek, a sob
    and the stenching inferno foul.

The noble American spirit was there,
in the aerie-topped monuments tall;
But America slept, she was deaf to the call
  ’til satan slapped hard at the wall ...
  ’til satan slapped hard at the wall.

The blow punched a ghastly hole in the wall:
in the smoke satan callously laughed.
    The Innocent blinded
    They wept and They clawed
    through the rubble and chaos of
    hell
    They prayed as the flame
    sucked the air from Their lungs
    and melted the steel in the walls;
    from high up above
    They tumbled and leapt
    to the maw of the hungry mass grave;
    Now buried alive, They wept
    and They clawed
to the waiting arms of their God ...
to the waiting arms of their God.

The temple crashed with pond’rous fury
in the morning’s darkest hour.
With a shaken lip and a teary eye,
the son said “We walk with God.”

I watched him and I thought it odd
Death’s Shadow could make him cower
    (Here where his father had likewise once stood
    with myriad swords, shield and flame;
    to call us to risk a horrible cost
    the devil’s will to tame ...
    The devil’s will to tame.
    With wisdom, restraint and
    much to be lost,
    he drew a line the sand ...
    With sweat and blood risked
    holocaust,
    He drew a line the sand).

Then time unfroze; the son’s eye firmed,
the Shadow coursed his veins with blood;
his grief must wait, tho’ the nation mourn;
his countenance drew morally taut.
With a steely glower the son looked out,
but bridled unsavory power.
Vengeance is His, but justice is ours:
“This act, it shall not stand.”

The Father is cruel, His lesson is harsh,
In our gut He emblazons his brand.
This heinous act, this wound most cruel:
“This act, it shall not stand.”

The son drank the cup with a painful draught
then re-echoed through the land:
“I vow it once again,” he said:
“This act, it shall not stand.”

To the heart of the meek now
may God stretch his hand,
for the cowardly act on these towers.
The world looks to us to replant the flower:
“This act, it shall not stand.”

Retreating again
to the comforting den,
to his harbor of darkness and flame;
satan slept
but was waked
in the night by the din:
    the pealing bells
    the clanging picks
    and roar of cranes and shouts;
still, satan turned to
his naked red bedmate
and hissed as he lovingly sneered:
  “Here once again I am safe now, my friend ...
  Here once again I am safe.”
   
But from deep in the chasm
another hushed voice
whispered ten million times strong.
The devil shuddered as
Ice coursed his veins,
and the voice came again from the Light:
  “No harbor is yours
  ’til your own grave is mined,
   and evil forever is banned.
  This act, simply never will stand, my friend ...
  This act, it shall not stand.”

With fury and vengeance
a mustard seed plant
where fell steel and concrete and soot;
The flower of Freedom will grow once again
in the junkyard at Liberty’s foot ...
in the junkyard at Liberty’s foot.

© 2001, Ed Swartley / Communic-8