Linked Together

What was a sunny day
turned surreal as I drove
that S-curve and heard
the report of the first,
waiting at the light
too bright sun behind
couldn’t see when
it turned green
the honk of horn behind
while our friends
were being killed

diving and burning
in the sky of ash
not alone, but no other way
to be in death
what began that day
was horror and shock
unable to tear one’s self away

for days we watched
cried banded together
no work, but promises of love
spoken like never before
wedded together in our
collective grief, we watched
nothing else to do

I woke from a dream
happy on the third day
they’d found those officers alive--
at work, they told me it wasn’t true
the report I’d heard
my dream
was just that, nothing else.

Even then, I wanted to say
how the evil illuminated our goodness
how the soul of the world came through
in these days and months of loss—

what you could find
if you looked close enough
was beauty, shimmering, like the fire
that took months to die--
those crushed were taken up
into the arms of strangers
people once distant, now entwined

the soul of the world cries every day
now, somewhere that evil persists
in someone’s life,

how can we laugh, find joy, peace,
stillness in the dark,
can poetry and song
and anger and commitment persist
in allowing us to move on

but not to forget, not to allow
this day to give permission
for another man’s sorrow
not to allow that echo of fire
surrounding the woman
engulfed in catastrophe
of collapse,
her aura just this bright white
melting,

not to allow this fire
to spread
uncontained

Speak against the pain
find solace in our days
that remain open in hope
against the ugliness
of that inhumane
(and now all these others)
day.