Poems From Inside Me

A Poem For the 13th Anniversary

Nine Eleven

So many things came down to one instant

Thirteen years ago today

I saw it happen but could barely conceive it

It all seemed so strange and far away

Just like the death of a president, many years ago

I will never forget the moment I heard

That one thing I wish I never had to know

I was standing in the TV room

Seeing New York on fire

Those towers came down so shockingly soon

After another plane hit another tower

Ever since then I sometimes have a dream

That the day of the nukes has come

And when I do I wake with a scream

And fear that the worst has been done

So many brave men and women

Soon answered their nation’s call

I remember having a candlelight vigil

In the early darkness of that chilly fall

The world had changed forever

All of us had lost some innocence

And with our US cousins we went together

Into the bombs bullets and turbulence

So many friends from my childhood

Were thrown into the cauldron of war

The love they had for all of us knew no ends

Some of them had seen battle before

I wish I could have gone with them

It hurts me that I could not

They did what they had to in that far off land

Our freedom and safety was bought

I can not say that I long for war

I have lived my whole life in a peaceful land

But it hurts inside that I can serve no more

It hurts like no one could understand

So as you think of the towers exploding

As you remember the thousands killed

Try not to feel my dark foreboding

And rest easy as God wills

Those veterans know how to bring down empires

They think little of risking life and limb

And each day all of them truly inspires

Me to draw my courage from deep within

We will always have our enemies

There shall always be battles and fights

But I will never forget the freedom bought for me

By those brave heroes marching off in the night

September 11, 2014

Leif Gregersen

http://www.edmontonwriter.com