OK.
One more.
This is the poem from which this book
gets its title, although it isn't the title of the poem.
It's a 9/11 poem, and it's the only 911
poem I've ever written, fortunately--
I think.
A great many poets went into complete frenzy
of 9/11 poems, which is to be expected, I think.
But once I finished this one, I was through.
I didn't need to write anymore.
One of the things that interests me about the disaster of 9/11
was the effect of technology--
the cell phone.
This was probably the first major disaster in our culture
in which people could be talking to their loved ones
while they were running down the stairs of the burning building
or while the plane was going down.
This, I don't think, had been common or had been happening,
and I fixated on it as somehow making the tragedy even worse.
I don't know exactly what I would
do under the circumstances, but I think calling up your wife
and telling her your plane's going down is kind of hard.
You have to think about it some.
It's called "One Morning."
This is a very rhetorical poem, as if somebody's
speaking over a loudspeaker to a large group of people--
as indeed I am, I guess.
Who was the last person to hear your voice on a cell phone
from an airplane over Pennsylvania
or from an office in a tower or as you were clambering down
a thousand steps on your way to the final seconds of your life?
Will the last person to hear your voice please stand?
Will the last person to hear your voice please
stop screaming-- stop remembering that you said,
I love you and hugs to the children,
and everything is going to be all right?
As the tall buildings open like lilies, bloom and descend,
may the last person to hear your voice not
remember the passion in your voice
as you lied to comfort the last person to hear your voice.
The plane flies into the future.
The building blossoms on television.
Summer is over.
Winter is approaching, and cold rain.
Soon the snow will cover everything.
Will the last person to hear your voice hear your voice
again in the silence as snow falls
on the ground where your ashes are mingled
with the ashes of others in an erasure that can never
be erased?
I did not witness the shocked response to your message.
I did not wait slumped against the kitchen
wall for the final click and dial tone
when the line went dead.
And the last person to hear your voice
felt death creeping like smoke under the door
along the floorboards and could not escape.
There will be a moment of silence.
There will be no excuse--
no explanation, no apology.
Will the last person to hear your voice
please leave the room now to make way for others?
[APPLAUSE]