Elegy for 9/11
The Office of the Dead
I
The morning had its small appointments: bread
Still warm inside the bag, a shirt retrieved
From where it hung all weekend on a chair,
The elevator’s brief society
Of lowered eyes and someone’s quiet joke.
Above the harbor, windows gathered light.
A woman set a photograph beside
Her telephone; a man took off his coat.
The day lay open, waiting to be used.
There would be time to call, to reconcile,
To buy the milk, to have the troublesome tooth
Attended to. Across the river, roofs
Shone with the blue September’s borrowed peace.
The coffee cooled. A cursor blinked and blinked.
II
Those who had brought the morning to its end
Had learned the ordinary arts of travel:
The folded ticket, luggage in the aisle,
The patient look, the fastening of belts.
Around them people settled into lives
Already elsewhere—someone at arrivals,
A hired car, the meeting after lunch.
A child looked out across the silver wing.
How thoroughly a purpose can erase
The breathing person seated at its side.
The cup passed hand to hand above the aisle;
A stranger shifted to make room for knees.
And all that slight accommodation went
Unnoticed by the men who would destroy it.
III
Then floors became an altitude of fire.
A stairwell narrowed to a stranger’s hand.
Descending people pressed against the wall
To let the others, carrying their weight
Of hose and tools, go upward through the smoke.
Beyond the broken windows, air remained
As clear as on the morning of creation.
Some stood where there was nothing left to stand on.
Below, a watcher could not lift his face
Or turn away. The distance held them both.
Against an ear, a telephone grew warm;
A voice repeated what it had to say.
Then all the weight the columns had sustained
Came down through rooms where people had been waiting.
IV
At the Potomac, smoke obscured the stone.
In Pennsylvania, earth received a plane
Whose passengers had risen from their seats.
The field lay torn beneath the open sky.
By evening, faces covered walls in rows:
A wedding guest, a father on a beach,
A woman laughing just outside the frame.
The living carried photographs through streets
And asked the living whether they had seen.
At home, a key lay waiting in a dish.
A coat retained the contour of a shoulder.
Someone called once more to hear the greeting
And listened to the little pause that followed,
Then left a message asking you to call.
I
The morning had its small appointments: bread
Still warm inside the bag, a shirt retrieved
From where it hung all weekend on a chair,
The elevator’s brief society
Of lowered eyes and someone’s quiet joke.
Above the harbor, windows gathered light.
A woman set a photograph beside
Her telephone; a man took off his coat.
The day lay open, waiting to be used.
There would be time to call, to reconcile,
To buy the milk, to have the troublesome tooth
Attended to. Across the river, roofs
Shone with the blue September’s borrowed peace.
The coffee cooled. A cursor blinked and blinked.
II
Those who had brought the morning to its end
Had learned the ordinary arts of travel:
The folded ticket, luggage in the aisle,
The patient look, the fastening of belts.
Around them people settled into lives
Already elsewhere—someone at arrivals,
A hired car, the meeting after lunch.
A child looked out across the silver wing.
How thoroughly a purpose can erase
The breathing person seated at its side.
The cup passed hand to hand above the aisle;
A stranger shifted to make room for knees.
And all that slight accommodation went
Unnoticed by the men who would destroy it.
III
Then floors became an altitude of fire.
A stairwell narrowed to a stranger’s hand.
Descending people pressed against the wall
To let the others, carrying their weight
Of hose and tools, go upward through the smoke.
Beyond the broken windows, air remained
As clear as on the morning of creation.
Some stood where there was nothing left to stand on.
Below, a watcher could not lift his face
Or turn away. The distance held them both.
Against an ear, a telephone grew warm;
A voice repeated what it had to say.
Then all the weight the columns had sustained
Came down through rooms where people had been waiting.
IV
At the Potomac, smoke obscured the stone.
In Pennsylvania, earth received a plane
Whose passengers had risen from their seats.
The field lay torn beneath the open sky.
By evening, faces covered walls in rows:
A wedding guest, a father on a beach,
A woman laughing just outside the frame.
The living carried photographs through streets
And asked the living whether they had seen.
At home, a key lay waiting in a dish.
A coat retained the contour of a shoulder.
Someone called once more to hear the greeting
And listened to the little pause that followed,
Then left a message asking you to call.
