For
a time I worked on my own, in a small office in the downtown section of our St.
Louis suburb (pop. 27,154). I was a short half block to our train station, a
block from the farmer’s market, next door to the bakery. I was on the
first-floor of a two-story building (we call that a skyscraper here),
sandwiched between a seamstress’s shop and a hair salon. Most days, my spaniel
joined me, sleeping somewhere near my feet.
One
morning, I turned on my computer and pulled up AOL (this was years before
social media). And the first thing I saw was smoke pouring from one the towers
of the World Trade Center. I flipped on my portable television, and watched a
plane hit the second tower.
The
Amtrak station was still a half a block away. The farmers market was opening
up. I could still smell the leftover fragrance of doughnuts frying at the
bakery. The hair stylist had just welcomed her first customer of the day, and
the seamstress was working on adjusting a party dress. The dog was still asleep
at my feet.
I
wasn’t sure whether my immediate environment or the scenes on the television
were the more unreal.
Can
poets and poems make sense of something like this?
To continue reading, please see my post today
at Tweetspeak Poetry.
Photograph by Jaime Jaime Junior via Public
Domain Pictures. Used with permission.
location location location
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