Wrote this today for this evening’s Creative Remembrances event. This event was a fundraiser for Amnesty International and the Disasters Emergency Committee. This was held in the characteristically shabby, yet atmospheric Platt Chapel Arts and Community Project nestled at the top of Platt Fields Park.
Fall Out
And then there was silence;
A solemn stillness.
Dressing the ground, the desiccated debris
Of café, house, school, shop
Shimmered like silica and fell to earth
Almost as if in slow motion.
And then there was silence;
Before then, a sonorous sky
Sounded out the tak-tak-tak of gunfire;
The fist fall of rockets glazed the night;
Frightening: but deathly beautiful was the light:
A fallout of illumination.
And then there was silence;
Slivers of silver
Stud the wall, the stars reflected;
Light refracted – mirrored by the eyes of families
Wandering the streets like walking wounded
Quietly tending to the dead and damaged.
And then there was silence;
Silken and strange;
An unexpected eulogy both innocent, and silent:
Soft tears submerged the eyes of those that were left.
Then the screaming began
And that broke the silence.
6th May 2009
GirlWideWeb
