September in New York

By Staceyann Chin
The collapsing towers
punctuated the 2001 summer like a period
foreboding

the black smoke curling perpetual thriller
               on the screen would mean
terror for so many
               reporters
watching horrified/weeping/dumbfounded
as body after body flew through the glass windows
               amidst the cement dust faces
               strangers held fast to each other
               the unspoken boundaries between New Yorkers
               disappeared/New Yorkers hugged
               coughed up the heavy hair
               meandered among the soot-covered cars
               the words Hijab/Jihad/Taliban were not yet known
               there was only the checkpoint traffic jams
               the unsolicited notes we wrote
               to long forgotten colleagues/cousins
coworkers gave each other
the benefit of the doubt
               enemies shouted pleasant greetings
               across the eerily quiet platform
               worn and disheveled/with nothing else to lose
               we were determined to love our neighbors

ever the skeptics began to believe it might last

               —but politicians/and opportunistic charlatans
               turned the tide quick to terror
a country made sick with talk of fear
of further attacks
folder as our leaders stacked the reasons we had to
               smoke them out
               root the evildoers out of their caves
within weeks boys barely shaving were bundled off
to wars in places unpronounceable
angry weapons with friendly names
were quickly aimed
at ordinary people/in Queens/in Brixton/in Kandahar

in New York
the smattering of protests were skillfully deflected
               —American lives were at stake
               something has to be done
               America needed to act
               that was a fact
images of villages dodging
cluster bombs
smart bombs
projectile bombs dominated the news
               the narrative of cowboys killing savages
               droned on while the streets of Manhattan
displayed crudely constructed posters
               making martyrs of the missing
               —September will always
remember the shell-shocked mourners
the towers/buckling/falling
the long hours spent calling hotlines
the months of not knowing
who has been at work that week
who had been fired the week before

the conspiracy theories threatened the worst in us
the religious rallied for blood
the exodus from Manhattan spiked the cost of apartments
               in Brooklyn
               in Astoria
               in Jersey City
almost a decade later
the poor can no longer afford their own homes
every port/every bridge/every tunnel
               every airport on the planet
regulates computers/liquids/gels/creams
shoes/belts/jackets/coats/hats/bags
everything is examined for irregularities
everything must be transparent
one-quart resealable polyethylene plastic bags

every year September holds still
the moment
before 9/11/after 9/11
we gather/at the end of summer
pray
reflect/remember the day
the New York skyline fractured
and sent the rest of the world
spinning
to piece itself together again

Staceyann Chin, "September in New York" from Crossfire: A Litany for Survival. Copyright © 2019 by Staceyann Chin.  Reprinted by permission of Haymarket Books.

Source: Crossfire: A Litany for Survival (Haymarket Books, 2019)