911
by Dale Neibaur (9/21/01)
Speak to me of blazing leaves,
Of frosted grass and crystal air.
Tempt me now with new-pressed cider
Or dewed grapes still on leaf-clad vine.
Rave of feasts to come, and promise
Love and cookies by a crackling fire.
Drag me forward ...
Summer died unseemly,
and I can naught but stand
and weep.
[I was preparing to leave for work on Tuesday, September 11th, 2001 when a cry from downstairs sent me hurrying to see what was the matter. The television was on, and one of the towers of the world trade center was burning. As I stood, arrested, a plane flew into the frame and smashed into the second tower. I sank onto the couch and watched unbelieving as the towers collapsed. It is one thing to know intellectually that the world is a violent and uncertain place. It is quite another to experience it directly. I was literally struck dumb; for days I could not write nor speak to any significant theme. Finally I wrote the above poem, and then the following thoughts.]
This evening I sat down and wrote my thoughts on the terrorist bombings. It
took hours, and I've seldom been so little pleased with the results. It's
exactly for that reason that I haven't written. Until I got this out, I
couldn't address another topic. When violent death visits, other subjects
become trivial. And yet so much has been said already. Maybe too much has
been said already. What words can I add, what actions perform, that will
add anything to the dialog? Anyway, I've pasted my thoughts below. At
least you'll know that I've been thinking of you, and trying to get through
this lump of unsayable things. In person I can be flippant, or dwell on the
insignificant details and ignore the elephant. I find that writing demands
more honesty of me. So here it is:
*****
In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the
Pentagon we've spent a lot of time talking to our kids, trying to help them
understand some of what has happened and regain some of their security.
I've spent a lot of hours meditating on what this means to our family, our
friends, our society. I am not so naive that this kind of action is
incomprehensible, nor so smug that I believed we were immune to the reach of
hate-filled men. As a student of history I have long known that the
mobility of our society -- geographic, social, political, economic -- is a
rare and wonderful exception to the usual rule of brute force. And I know
that it exists because of the extraordinary level of trust that permeates
every level of our society. We eat food we have not prepared and take no
thought of poisons. We walk unarmed through strange places with little or
no care for our physical security. We contract with strangers to transport
us, lodge us, feed us, give us goods. And because the vast majority of our
society is made of men and women of good will, the trust has accumulated
until most of us gave it almost no thought ...
It is the loss of that trust that I mourn, along with the loss of life. And
I find myself deeply, bitterly angry that men incapable of building
something themselves should usurp the proper use of exquisite delicate
engineering marvels and smash them together like bratty spoiled sand-lot
bullies. Our buildings and our airplanes are marvels of art and science
more astounding and more beautiful than the sphinx or the Parthenon. Left
unravaged, our skyscrapers may last as long. Each is the expression of
thousands of men working in concert to create something beyond themselves,
something beautiful to leave as a gift for the future. Destruction is
always easier than construction; always quicker and more spectacular. Just
as death is more riveting than quiet life. But ultimately we can rebuild
all our "stuff" again, and more. If we can just hold our trust ...
But the lives lost cannot be reclaimed. There is a hole we cannot fill, a
fire we cannot douse. I read a letter written by a 22-year old Palestinian
woman who, while condemning the attack, said that our outrage can not match
hers because we lost "businessmen" while she'd seen parents weeping for
slain children and children vowing vengeance over the bleeding corpses of
their parents. How do we have a dialogue, she and I? To her the men and
women in the tower were automatons, generalizations of the "them" that
control a world she is shut from. As generalizations they were not human,
and so not to be valued or mourned at the same level as the people she knew.
To me they seem very real -- I am one of them. I have been to the viewing
level atop the trade center; I can envision all too clearly what it must
have felt like to be there. I have a cell phone -- what would I say to
Terry if I had but one call left? To me these were comrades, spouses,
lovers, people young and old with rich hopes and rich lives that did not
deserve to have their lives ripped away. How does our loss assuage her
pain? And how can we go about addressing the causes of this new threat
without making things worse?
I confess I have little hope for a good outcome. Make no mistake: the men
who planned this deed committed the worse kind of murder. They targeted
unsuspecting victims with no warning and no discrimination, looking for the
maximum body count and the maximum media coverage. They do not look even to
take booty or capture territory; motives which we could at least understand.
There is nothing that these people had which the terrorists wanted, except
trust in one another. The lives lost -- both ours and the terrorists' --
were spent just to make us feel impotent, to create terror and hatred, and
to provoke a reaction. Such murders cannot be ignored. The men who acted
so must be sought and brought to justice.
But look at history. From such acts, and their reprisals, spring the
deep-seated hatreds that live for generations. Generalizations are made,
stereotypes are drawn, insults are traded and blood is shed. And then we're
back to gang violence. Has force solved the problems in the Balkans? In
Palestine? In Ireland? Have the Basque people buckled under centuries of
violent pressure? Any indiscriminate response risks welding us into the
same cycle of hate and death that we ardently wish to avoid. But if our
enemy demands it, we cannot escape. That is the fearful nature of our
dilemma. We can never trust an enemy who values neither our life nor his
own. Without trust there can be no discussions, no contracts, no
understandings or agreements, no law. And where there is no law then
inevitably there is violence.
I don't know if I should send all this junk to you or not. It reads like a
paper without a thesis, like a problem with no solution. It is neither
hopeful nor helpful. It says nothing new. And to me it sounds so sterile,
as if I view all of this as some intellectual exercise. But it isn't that
at all. I feel like I did as a kid when the school would run atomic-bomb
drills; like the best part of the world might vaporize in smoke and ash at
any moment. The only good that I can see is that each day feels like a last
sweet gift from God. Intellectually I know I'm in shock, emotionally I
don't know what to do about it. And anyway, none of this is really about
me. I live in a quiet place of great beauty, and there are few targets
worth attacking here. The winter Olympics may change all that, but for now
I and my family are as safe as we can be. No terrorists are likely to
strike. The more likely causes of grief are disease or accident, and they
haven't changed. My health is good, my family does well. I am in the midst
of loving friends, and I have more than I need of everything. Except hope.
May God bless us all with hope.