The Towers fell down today,
My son says to me, his head
Emerging, again, out of the water,
In this bathtub, before disappearing again,
Below the surface,
His body still there, but submerged, wavy,
And dislocated from itself, and I know that
What he said is really a question,
Because they told him about 9/11,
At school, and he wants to know,
How or why,
But I only tell him parts,
About how I was there,
How the Towers were there,
And then they weren’t, and
How there were two planes,
Shaped like birds, hitting glass,
And knocking the Towers down,
And how I ran.
And I leave out the other parts,
About how there were people,
In the Towers, in the planes, and
How a body looks when it is falling
Through the sky, or on the ground,
After it lands and I cannot say them,
Words like terror and war or kill, and
I do not tell him about the body parts,
How most of the bodies are only
Pieces, now, the pieces of people,
Who were there, and now are not,
Or how some of the pieces are small
Enough to fit into the palm of his hand,
And he is getting out of the bathtub now,
His foot, a calf, a thigh, hips, and a torso,
Chest and neck and a head,
A set of arms, or how he is
Stretching his hand out to reach mine,
So I will pull him out.
