The Towers of York - A 9/11 Ballad

I. Not Today (Yesterday)

Many yesterdays ago, in a feverish time,
When Hell bent the world in a peaceful sign,
High over York rose a towering display.
Alas for that hope evil was born to betray.

At his birth seers warned, “The end of the world is today.”

Travel’d we there to gaze at the sight,
To witness this twin silver monument to might.
It soared to the clouds, to conquer the sky.
While others exclaimed, I only could sigh,

“Shadows fall over a day far from today.”

Fearfully I stared at the façade’s Gothic arch,
Then up the sleek girders gusted by March.
“What think you,” asked they, “of buildings so tall?”
Said I, with a shudder, “York’s Towers shall fall.”

“How say you so, miss?! They rose only today!”

“Peevish nonsense,” cried they, “from a girl of thirteen!
‘Tis but dizzy heights imagination has seen.”
Dazzling towers I’d view’d that rose to great heights.
But no pinnacle had crush’d the heart with such fright.

“The Towers will fall! I’ve seen enough for today!”

A bright future those slender arches belied;
Beyond their façade lay the ruins of pride.
Above their cold shadow, silver met the gold sun.
But its weight poorly borne, frail beauty’d succumb.

“Pray God, should they fall, let it not be today!”

Up we sped through the tower, my mind ill at ease,
Fears foster’d in magnitude by brothers who tease.
In mind’s eye did approach future terror on wing.
‘Twixt heav’n and earth, no refuge to cling.

Mist-vanish’d fate’s bolt would not strike today.

“How come you to think of such gloomy disaster?
Give us some reason for this Armageddon of plaster!”
“Perhaps an explosion, like the ones that wrack Eire;
A bomb in the basement, or maybe the spire.”

“One tower may explode, but not both in one day!”

“To accomplish that feat would need an army of men
To go unseen from floor one to one hundred and ten!”
“A storm then,” tried I, “with a wind of such power
To shatter the glass and send it down in a shower.”

“The sun shines brightly! There’s no danger today!”

“Its supports are outside,” one yielded, “’tis true.
A fire could melt it, but could a fire melt two?
For lightning to strike twice would be quite a plan.”
Said I, in a caution, “Don’t underestimate Man.”

“We promise the Towers won’t fall – not today!”

Man builds empires up to the sky;
The physical materials God does supply.
But the material world’s the Devil’s to rule.
Against Man’s ambition, he plots chaos most cruel.

Man can’t reach Heaven with towers of steel
Nor trade for God’s love by making a deal.
Yet York’s Towers won’t fall by God’s loving hand -
The spiteful Devil shall knock down our castles of sand.

“The Towers won’t fall. What more can we say?!”

Away in disgust my audience drew.
‘Twas impossible for a girl to know what I knew.
Not for my pleasure did I divine the Unknown.
Sight came unbidden, unwillingly shown.

“They won’t see the truth. Oh no, not today.”

II. Signs of the Times (Today)

Now it’s today and people are weeping.
From the inferno, the hopeless are desperately leaping.
One tower wobbles, wagging its finger,
“Calamity’s upon you, dare not you linger!”

At Hudson’s last bridge, they look’d for a sign;
Their target in sight, with Fate they align’d.
Like a bird in whose reflection an enemy glares,
They slamm’d through the glass with their innocent fares.

To fight such a blaze needs an army of men
To climb from floor one to one hundred and ten.
Ten claxons clang for the World Trade Center;
Into the fiery maw, only the bravest dare enter.

Heroes and victims pass on the stairs.
Fate’s the precarious splitting of hairs.
Gasping for breath and toting their gear,
Those who go up must set aside fear.

York halts in horror to stare at the sight;
Billows of smoke turning day into night.
How, on this perfect day of sky blue,
Could tragedy strike, such hatred spew?

Stop up your ears to the thunder of rubble,
To the explosion of rage bursting our bubble.
To safety the panicking crowds madly run
From the hideous cloud that wipes out the sun.

All that is left of the towers I saw
Is the skeleton clinging to life by a claw.
Nothing is left to bury the dead.
Their ashes have buried the city instead.

The shadow of silence befalls our great land;
All music and laughter – even our band.
Not a bird, not a plane, not a single sweet note.
Every sound but crying has the enemy smote.

Six weeks has it taken for peace to return.
Even now, the smoldering ruins still burn.
“How could this happen?” ask we, wringing our hands.
“America was surely the safest of lands?”

Long is the story of sorrow and grief,
Of how America fail’d to keep out the thief.
Of closing our eyes and our ears to the fey.
Of saying too often, “Oh no, not today.”

Into our country fanatics were welcome,
No matter how dang’rous their activities made them.
Political correction corrupted the rules,
Allowing them to march onto our planes with their tools.

The mind guards fast an obstinate gate
Against the grim specter of unthinkable Fate.
When safe in the present Men warnings ignore,
The future’s a battlefield scarred by war.

III. The Test of Time (Tomorrow)

The long years have passed and now it’s tomorrow.
Fate’s spared us to finish the tale of our sorrow.
The fall of York’s Towers caus’d the breaking of hearts,
Suffr’d even by those with the smallest of parts.

On that terror-fill’d day, York stood not alone;
Against other symbols was death being flown.
Anxiously, Americans scanned the blue sky
For zealots who were praying to Allah to die.

For three harrow’d days after the fall,
O’er York hung bleak a dust-poisn’d pall.
For three days more, the cold North Wind flew,
Restoring the sky to that morning’s true blue.

In funerals and ceremonies to honor the dead,
Sad songs were sung and eulogies read.
The Towers deflated to a six-story pile;
An anguish to clear in air cindr’d vile.

One sleepy dawn came a low distant thunder;
With a roar it rent the stricken silence asunder.
The eagle was bound for strife-ridden lands,
Bringing justice’s wrath to those hid in the sands.

The grief-stupor’d nation awakened at last.
The Ground Zero flag flew from Ted’s mast.
No more taken for granted the stars and the stripes;
Freedom’s banner wav’d defiant in all sizes and types.

On went the descent of the now-aging year,
Yet the season of fall was loth to appear.
Springtime’s red robin, driven off by fall’s crows,
Returned to the garden and sang in the boughs.

Straight through the winter robin sang a bright tune.
The rose bloomed at Christmas as though it were June.
A balm of peace offr’d at the gift-giving season.
God’s mercy and pity transcend human reason.

Travel’d we back to gaze at the site;
Gone is the twin silver monument to might.
Where once lofty arches loomed fragile but fair,
Naught now remains but columns of air.

‘Tis lighter and warmer, but the shadows are chill;
Disbelief and mute awe do the empty void fill.
In the ruins the echoes of footsteps still clatter
And the wind carries whispers of long-ago chatter.

“Sixty years when I’m old?” asks a young voice from the past.
“Will that be how long York’s Towers will last?”
“More like thirty;” says the elder, “’tis I who’ll be gray.”
Twenty-nine years and six months, give or take an odd day.

When view’d from the past, tomorrow’s but today.

Always in mem’ry may York’s Towers arise;
Remember their splendor and not their demise.
May those who were lost be found in God’s glory
And granted a happier end to this story.

The Towers of York – A Ballad

Copyright 2001 Carole J. Rafferty

This Time, It's Different

As the 10th Anniversary of the September 11th Attacks nears, New York City and Washington, D.C. are under a credible and apparently very serious terrorist threat. According to one early news report, terrorists were caught in Ottawa, Canada, with a 2,000 pound bomb. To give you some perspective, the bomb Ramzi Yousef built to blow up the World Trade Center in 1993 was 1,500 pounds – and he told security officials that he failed to blow up the building because he didn’t have enough money for a bigger bomb. Whatever they had in mind to blow up, it had to be pretty big.

Ten years ago, we were woefully unprepared for an attack. We should have been. The first WTC attack should have been a five-star alarm. Instead, because Pres. Clinton didn’t want any encounters with foreign nations, the terrorists used forged passports, and the FBI and CIA weren’t allowed to share information, the attack was treated like a criminal matter. In other words, law enforcement couldn’t do anything until the bomb went off.

According to Richard Miniter’s new book, Mastermind: The Many Faces of the 9/11 Architect, Khalid Shakh Mohammed, law enforcement was suspicious of Yousef, not so much of KSM, but couldn’t do anything about him because of legal constraints.

Even when al-Qaeda itself taunted us (with copy prepared undoubtedly by KSM himself), we still did nothing. Average Americans believed it. Law enforcement either didn’t, or couldn’t, do anything about it until something happened.  That was ten years ago. We now have various agencies on guard against every sort of attack the terrorists can dream up. There’s a number citizens can call if they notice suspicious activity, which certainly didn’t exist ten years ago.

Miniter’s book is a fascinating look at KSM; it’s like reading Mario Puzo’s The Godfather. KSM’s entire family, in fact, is in “the business.” They’re like an Islamic Mafia family, with KSM’s father as the titular “Allah-Father”. They were responsible for assassination attempts on the late Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Miniter gives us an accurate portrait of the attention-craving, arrogant, mocking terrorist we’ve all come to know and hate. He grew up a second-class citizen in a suburb of Kuwait City. Although he was born in Kuwait, KSM’s family would technically be considered Iranian, coming from the mountainous Baluchistan region between Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. They considered themselves to be Baluchis. KSM was a man without a country. So he embraced the religion of Islam and its jihadism, which recognizes no real nationality, instead.

Other terrorists say that he was in the habit of stealing their murderous ideas, and that the idea to ram jets into skyscrapers was the idea of one of the pilots whom he was trying to recruit. Whatever. KSM got his training, but no real glory, in Afghanistan, where he and his nephew Ramzi, only a few years younger than himself, went to get a piece of the action.

He probably met Osama Bin Laden there, as all new, promising recruits were required to do, but their relationship wouldn’t become formalized until after he and Ramzi made their names in the first World Trade Center attack. According to Miniter, Bin Laden found the creative murderer promising, but undisciplined. A bone of contention between them was that KSM was very quick to make decisions, taking risks and dealing with the aftermath later, where OBL took his time, which irritated KSM, a hastiness that may just have saved many more lives in the 9/11 attacks.

KSM is in prison now, just like the Blind Sheikh, whose imprisonment the terrorists were trying to avenge on 9/11. Now we have one more prisoner – KSM himself – and mercifully dead Osama Bin Laden whom the terrorists will probably try to avenge.

They may succeed. We must be on our guard. They may not succeed, on the other hand, because we are on our guard. Not only is our security better prepared, but so are our citizens. We’re ready, not only to report any suspicious terrorist activity, but to thwart any suspicious political or legislative activity. Barney Frank, who co-authored the original bill in 1987, allowing foreign students to basically overstay their student visas with impunity, is in the sites of the Tea Party. So are other politically-correction, apologist politicians who might try to undue or resurrect legislation that would allow terrorists to carry on with their jihadist mission and moderate Muslims to stealthily build the foundation for Shariah Law in the United States.

We have to have it right 100 percent of the time; they only have to be right once. But we’re all going to make it darned difficult to pull off another 9/11. We’re ready (as we can be) for them – and we’re not afraid.  We're not going to play the sheep heading helplessly towards the slaughter.  We've learned our lesson from 9/11.

The Towers of York - A 9/11 Ballad

I.                     Not Today (Yesterday)

Many yesterdays ago, in a feverish time,

When Hell bent the world in a peaceful sign,

High over York rose a towering display.

Alas for that hope evil was born to betray.

At his birth seers warned, “The end of the world is today.”

Travel’d we there to gaze at the sight,

To witness this twin silver monument to might.

It soared to the clouds, to conquer the sky.

While others exclaimed, I only could sigh,

“Shadows fall over a day far from today.”

Fearfully I stared at the façade’s Gothic arch,

Then up the sleek girders gusted by March.

“What think you,” asked they, “of buildings so tall?”

Said I, with a shudder, “York’s Towers shall fall.”

“How say you so, miss?!  They rose only today!”

“Peevish nonsense,” cried they, “from a girl of thirteen!

‘Tis but dizzy heights imagination has seen.”

Dazzling towers I’d view’d that rose to great heights.

But no pinnacle had crush’d the heart with such fright.

“The Towers will fall!  I’ve seen enough for today!”

A bright future those slender arches belied;

Beyond their façade lay the ruins of pride.

Above their cold shadow, silver met the gold sun.

But its weight poorly borne, frail beauty’d succumb.

“Pray God, should they fall, let it not be today!”

Up we sped through the tower, my mind ill at ease,

Fears foster’d in magnitude by brothers who tease.

In mind’s eye did approach future terror on wing.

‘Twixt heav’n and earth, no refuge to cling.

Mist-vanish’d fate’s bolt would not strike today.

“How come you to think of such gloomy disaster?

Give us some reason for this Armageddon of plaster!”

“Perhaps an explosion, like the ones that wrack Eire;

A bomb in the basement, or maybe the spire.”

“One tower may explode, but not both in one day!”

“To accomplish that feat would need an army of men

To go unseen from floor one to one hundred and ten!”

“A storm then,” tried I, “with a wind of such power

To shatter the glass and send it down in a shower.”

“The sun shines brightly!  There’s no danger today!”

“Its supports are outside,” one yielded, “’tis true.

A fire could melt it, but could a fire melt two?

For lightning to strike twice would be quite a plan.”

Said I, in a caution, “Don’t underestimate Man.”

“We promise the Towers won’t fall – not today!”

Man builds empires up to the sky;

The physical materials God does supply.

But the material world’s the Devil’s to rule.

Against Man’s ambition, he plots chaos most cruel.

Man can’t reach Heaven with towers of steel

Nor trade for God’s love by making a deal.

Yet York’s Towers won’t fall by God’s loving hand -

The spiteful Devil shall knock down our castles of sand.

“The Towers won’t fall.  What more can we say?!”

Away in disgust my audience drew.

‘Twas impossible for a girl to know what I knew.

Not for my pleasure did I divine the Unknown.

Sight came unbidden, unwillingly shown.

“They won’t see the truth.  Oh no, not today.”

II.                  Signs of the Times (Today)

Now it’s today and people are weeping.

From the inferno, the hopeless are desperately leaping.

One tower wobbles, wagging its finger,

“Calamity’s upon you, dare not you linger!”

At Hudson’s last bridge, they look’d for a sign;

Their target in sight, with Fate they align’d.

Like a bird in whose reflection an enemy glares,

They slamm’d through the glass with their innocent fares.

To fight such a blaze needs an army of men

To climb from floor one to one hundred and ten.

Ten claxons clang for the World Trade Center;

Into the fiery maw, only the bravest dare enter.

Heroes and victims pass on the stairs.

Fate’s the precarious splitting of hairs.

Gasping for breath and toting their gear,

Those who go up must set aside fear.

York halts in horror to stare at the sight;

Billows of smoke turning day into night.

How, on this perfect day of sky blue,

Could tragedy strike, such hatred spew?

Stop up your ears to the thunder of rubble,

To the explosion of rage bursting our bubble.

To safety the panicking crowds madly run

From the hideous cloud that wipes out the sun.

All that is left of the towers I saw

Is the skeleton clinging to life by a claw.

Nothing is left to bury the dead.

Their ashes have buried the city instead.

The shadow of silence befalls our great land;

All music and laughter – even our band.

Not a bird, not a plane, not a single sweet note.

Every sound but crying has the enemy smote.

Six weeks has it taken for peace to return.

Even now, the smoldering ruins still burn.

“How could this happen?” ask we, wringing our hands.

“America was surely the safest of lands?”

Long is the story of sorrow and grief,

Of how America fail’d to keep out the thief.

Of closing our eyes and our ears to the fey.

Of saying too often, “Oh no, not today.”

Into our country fanatics were welcome,

No matter how dang’rous their activities made them.

Political correction corrupted the rules,

Allowing them to march onto our planes with their tools.

The mind guards fast an obstinate gate

Against the grim specter of unthinkable Fate.

When safe in the present Men warnings ignore,

The future’s a battlefield scarred by war.

III.               The Test of Time (Tomorrow)

The long year has passed and now it’s tomorrow.

Fate’s spared us to finish the tale of our sorrow.

The fall of York’s Towers caus’d the breaking of hearts,

Suffr’d even by those with the smallest of parts.

On that terror-fill’d day, York stood not alone;

Against other symbols was death being flown.

Anxiously, Americans scanned the blue sky

For zealots who were praying to Allah to die.

For three harrow’d days after the fall,

O’er York hung bleak a dust-poisn’d pall.

For three days more, the cold North Wind flew,

Restoring the sky to that morning’s true blue.

In funerals and ceremonies to honor the dead,

Sad songs were sung and eulogies read.

The Towers deflated to a six-story pile;

An anguish to clear in air cindr’d vile.

One sleepy dawn came a low distant thunder;

With a roar it rent the stricken silence asunder.

The eagle was bound for strife-ridden lands,

Bringing justice’s wrath to those hid in the sands.

The grief-stupor’d nation awakened at last.

The Ground Zero flag flew from Ted’s mast.

No more taken for granted the stars and the stripes;

Freedom’s banner wav’d defiant in all sizes and types.

On went the descent of the now-aging year,

Yet the season of fall was loth to appear.

Springtime’s red robin, driven off by fall’s crows,

Returned to the garden and sang in the boughs.

Straight through the winter robin sang a bright tune.

The rose bloomed at Christmas as though it were June.

A balm of peace offr’d at the gift-giving season.

God’s mercy and pity transcend human reason.

Travel’d we back to gaze at the site;

Gone is the twin silver monument to might.

Where once lofty arches loomed fragile but fair,

Naught now remains but columns of air.

‘Tis lighter and warmer, but the shadows are chill;

Disbelief and mute awe do the empty void fill.

In the ruins the echoes of footsteps still clatter

And the wind carries whispers of long-ago chatter.

“Sixty years when I’m old?” asks a young voice from the past.

“Will that be how long York’s Towers will last?”

“More like thirty;” says the elder, “’tis I who’ll be gray.”

Twenty-nine years and six months, give or take an odd day.

When view’d from the past, tomorrow’s but today.

Always in mem’ry may York’s Towers arise;

Remember their splendor and not their demise.

May those who were lost be found in God’s glory

And granted a happier end to this story.

The Towers of York – A Ballad

Copyright Ó2001 Carole J. Rafferty

Adding Insult to Dhimmitry: Funding the Ground Zero Mosque

Here on the eve of the 10^th Anniversary of the September 11^th attacks, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation is considering a $5 million federal grant to Park 51, the official project name of the Ground Zero Mosque.  Normally, you would think the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights would apply – the government shall make no laws respecting religion and all that.

But according to the their grant application, they should be allotted the money in order  to “fund social service programs for all the residents of Lower Manhattan such as domestic violence prevention, Arabic and other foreign language classes, programs and services for homeless veterans, two multi-cultural art exhibits and immigration services.”

Among the Ground Zero mosque’s offerings are courses in Shariah Law.  Among Shariah Law’s notable dictates are:  death by stoning for adultery, child marriage, proscription of independent speech, writing, printing and broadcasting, decriminalization of abuse of women, no rights for wives in divorce, as well as requiring all Muslims to wage Jihad against non-believers and commit violence to achieve its goals.

It’s no wonder they want to build the mosque at Ground Zero, as they have done with every city they’ve conquered throughout their long history.  Americans have been protesting this mosque since it was first proposed.  The building it will be replacing was destroyed on September 11^th when a piece of the landing gear tore through the roof right down to the basement.

Manhattanites have told us to mind our own business.  But now that they want federal funds to build this outrageous insult to the American people, to those in the buildings who survived, and to the family members of those who didn’t, it is our business.

If we don’t want that mosque built, we certainly don’t want our hard-earned tax dollars paying for it.  We don’t want to hear any politically correct, mediating excuses about first amendment rights.  We don’t want to hear how we should be more diverse and inclusive.  We shouldn’t be told to “get over” September 11^th, or that somehow America deserved the attacks.  Above all, we shouldn’t be told we don’t understand the true, peaceful nature of Islam, or that we’re offending those peaceful Muslims by objecting to the building of, and worse, the bank-rolling of, this mosque.

The Liberals speak of right-wing “hatred.”  Find a picture of 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta.  Take a good, hard look.  Then tell us about “hatred.”  Don’t be at all surprised if the Ground Zero mosque builds a marble statue of him in honor of the September 11^th attacks which Manhattanites will be encourage – and will flock – to pay homage to.

And why not?  There’s a statue of murderer Che Guavera in New York City.  Why wouldn't Lower Manhattan honor the "hero" of 9/11?  They won't allow the true heroes - the 9/11 Firs Responders - to speak at or even attend this Sunday's ceremony.  Maybe they could broadcast a speech by KSM from his villa at Guantanamo.

A National Review columnist based in New York wrote about her kids growing up in the "Frozen Zone."  When another child asked her son why there were so many barricades, he answered, "Well, this is New York."

Why is there going to be a Ground Zero Mosque?  Well, because this is New York.

The Towers of York - A 9/11 Ballad

I.                     Not Today (Yesterday)

Many yesterdays ago, in a feverish time,

When Hell bent the world in a peaceful sign,

High over York rose a towering display.

Alas for that hope evil was born to betray.

At his birth seers warned, “The end of the world is today.”

Travel’d we there to gaze at the sight,

To witness this twin silver monument to might.

It soared to the clouds, to conquer the sky.

While others exclaimed, I only could sigh,

“Shadows fall over a day far from today.”

Fearfully I stared at the façade’s Gothic arch,

Then up the sleek girders gusted by March.

“What think you,” asked they, “of buildings so tall?”

Said I, with a shudder, “York’s Towers shall fall.”

“How say you so, miss?!  They rose only today!”

“Peevish nonsense,” cried they, “from a girl of thirteen!

‘Tis but dizzy heights imagination has seen.”

Dazzling towers I’d view’d that rose to great heights.

But no pinnacle had crush’d the heart with such fright.

“The Towers will fall!  I’ve seen enough for today!”

A bright future those slender arches belied;

Beyond their façade lay the ruins of pride.

Above their cold shadow, silver met the gold sun.

But its weight poorly borne, frail beauty’d succumb.

“Pray God, should they fall, let it not be today!”

Up we sped through the tower, my mind ill at ease,

Fears foster’d in magnitude by brothers who tease.

In mind’s eye did approach future terror on wing.

‘Twixt heav’n and earth, no refuge to cling.

Mist-vanish’d fate’s bolt would not strike today.

“How come you to think of such gloomy disaster?

Give us some reason for this Armageddon of plaster!”

“Perhaps an explosion, like the ones that wrack Eire;

A bomb in the basement, or maybe the spire.”

“One tower may explode, but not both in one day!”

“To accomplish that feat would need an army of men

To go unseen from floor one to one hundred and ten!”

“A storm then,” tried I, “with a wind of such power

To shatter the glass and send it down in a shower.”

“The sun shines brightly!  There’s no danger today!”

“Its supports are outside,” one yielded, “’tis true.

A fire could melt it, but could a fire melt two?

For lightning to strike twice would be quite a plan.”

Said I, in a caution, “Don’t underestimate Man.”

“We promise the Towers won’t fall – not today!”

Man builds empires up to the sky;

The physical materials God does supply.

But the material world’s the Devil’s to rule.

Against Man’s ambition, he plots chaos most cruel.

Man can’t reach Heaven with towers of steel

Nor trade for God’s love by making a deal.

Yet York’s Towers won’t fall by God’s loving hand -

The spiteful Devil shall knock down our castles of sand.

“The Towers won’t fall.  What more can we say?!”

Away in disgust my audience drew.

‘Twas impossible for a girl to know what I knew.

Not for my pleasure did I divine the Unknown.

Sight came unbidden, unwillingly shown.

“They won’t see the truth.  Oh no, not today.”

II.                  Signs of the Times (Today)

Now it’s today and people are weeping.

From the inferno, the hopeless are desperately leaping.

One tower wobbles, wagging its finger,

“Calamity’s upon you, dare not you linger!”

At Hudson’s last bridge, they look’d for a sign;

Their target in sight, with Fate they align’d.

Like a bird in whose reflection an enemy glares,

They slamm’d through the glass with their innocent fares.

To fight such a blaze needs an army of men

To climb from floor one to one hundred and ten.

Ten claxons clang for the World Trade Center;

Into the fiery maw, only the bravest dare enter.

Heroes and victims pass on the stairs.

Fate’s the precarious splitting of hairs.

Gasping for breath and toting their gear,

Those who go up must set aside fear.

York halts in horror to stare at the sight;

Billows of smoke turning day into night.

How, on this perfect day of sky blue,

Could tragedy strike, such hatred spew?

Stop up your ears to the thunder of rubble,

To the explosion of rage bursting our bubble.

To safety the panicking crowds madly run

From the hideous cloud that wipes out the sun.

All that is left of the towers I saw

Is the skeleton clinging to life by a claw.

Nothing is left to bury the dead.

Their ashes have buried the city instead.

The shadow of silence befalls our great land;

All music and laughter – even our band.

Not a bird, not a plane, not a single sweet note.

Every sound but crying has the enemy smote.

Six weeks has it taken for peace to return.

Even now, the smoldering ruins still burn.

“How could this happen?” ask we, wringing our hands.

“America was surely the safest of lands?”

Long is the story of sorrow and grief,

Of how America fail’d to keep out the thief.

Of closing our eyes and our ears to the fey.

Of saying too often, “Oh no, not today.”

Into our country fanatics were welcome,

No matter how dang’rous their activities made them.

Political correction corrupted the rules,

Allowing them to march onto our planes with their tools.

The mind guards fast an obstinate gate

Against the grim specter of unthinkable Fate.

When safe in the present Men warnings ignore,

The future’s a battlefield scarred by war.

III.               The Test of Time (Tomorrow)

The long year has passed and now it’s tomorrow.

Fate’s spared us to finish the tale of our sorrow.

The fall of York’s Towers caus’d the breaking of hearts,

Suffr’d even by those with the smallest of parts.

On that terror-fill’d day, York stood not alone;

Against other symbols was death being flown.

Anxiously, Americans scanned the blue sky

For zealots who were praying to Allah to die.

For three harrow’d days after the fall,

O’er York hung bleak a dust-poisn’d pall.

For three days more, the cold North Wind flew,

Restoring the sky to that morning’s true blue.

In funerals and ceremonies to honor the dead,

Sad songs were sung and eulogies read.

The Towers deflated to a six-story pile;

An anguish to clear in air cindr’d vile.

One sleepy dawn came a low distant thunder;

With a roar it rent the stricken silence asunder.

The eagle was bound for strife-ridden lands,

Bringing justice’s wrath to those hid in the sands.

The grief-stupor’d nation awakened at last.

The Ground Zero flag flew from Ted’s mast.

No more taken for granted the stars and the stripes;

Freedom’s banner wav’d defiant in all sizes and types.

On went the descent of the now-aging year,

Yet the season of fall was loth to appear.

Springtime’s red robin, driven off by fall’s crows,

Returned to the garden and sang in the boughs.

Straight through the winter robin sang a bright tune.

The rose bloomed at Christmas as though it were June.

A balm of peace offr’d at the gift-giving season.

God’s mercy and pity transcend human reason.

Travel’d we back to gaze at the site;

Gone is the twin silver monument to might.

Where once lofty arches loomed fragile but fair,

Naught now remains but columns of air.

‘Tis lighter and warmer, but the shadows are chill;

Disbelief and mute awe do the empty void fill.

In the ruins the echoes of footsteps still clatter

And the wind carries whispers of long-ago chatter.

“Sixty years when I’m old?” asks a young voice from the past.

“Will that be how long York’s Towers will last?”

“More like thirty;” says the elder, “’tis I who’ll be gray.”

Twenty-nine years and six months, give or take an odd day.

When view’d from the past, tomorrow’s but today.

Always in mem’ry may York’s Towers arise;

Remember their splendor and not their demise.

May those who were lost be found in God’s glory

And granted a happier end to this story.

The Towers of York – A Ballad

Copyright Ó2001 Carole J. Rafferty

Jousting Over Jobs

The highlight of last night’s GOP debate was the duel between primary hopefuls Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Mitt Romney, of Massachusetts, over who created the most private sector jobs.   Meanwhile, Obama is making last-minute preparations over tonight’s Jobs Speech, where he will reportedly unveil a $400 billion plan involving infrastructure spending and tax relief, in an effort to take the Republican House’s lead as Tea Partier in Chief. 

Even right there in the Reagan Library, Perry and Romney didn’t seem to understand Reagan’s basic economic mantra:  big government is the problem, not the solution.  Obama’s problem is that he puts dollar signs in front of his solutions.  He’s rather like the scarecrow in the Wizard Oz, in that he points the way in both directions:  he’s going to spend and he’s going to cut.

Let’s say that that $400 billion is going to be divided in half; one-half for spending, the other half, for saving.  The sum of his quirky, economic math is:  zero.  The two halves cancel each other out.  That means he’s really going to do zero – nothing.  He’s still going to spend $200 billion.

Meanwhile, we-who-are-about-to-be-unemployed suffered through yet another Torture Chamber meeting, where we were shown, in vivid graphics, just how hopeless the situation is going to be for most of us.  Big Government and Big Business don’t understand and probably don’t care what a mess they make when they uproot families.  They might think of that as they look at the numerous uprooted trees and uprooted families, flooded out of their homes in our rain-train-drained state.

Just move to another state.  That’s easy for Big Government and Big Business to say, from their marbled towers and paneled conference rooms.  Their living room furniture isn’t sitting out on the front lawn along with the moldied, muddied electronics and kitchen appliances.  They’re not worried about working spouses whose jobs aren’t or can’t simply relocate, or divorced couples with custody disputes over how far away the custodial parent can move (about 20 miles, in one case).

Probably, a company’s relocation offer would be welcome at this point, if you live in rain-soaked northern New Jersey.  That is, if the company will cover your flood plain home.  The rain didn’t drive the companies away, though.  But the excessive taxes, their employees’ cost-of-living, and over-regulation, did. 

Is God warning New Jersey Noahs to get out of the state?  The flood is here.  Judging by last night’s debate and last night’s rainfall, the politicians, for all their money, are pretty useless.  The Passaic River is going to overflow its banks again; some say it’s going to be higher than during Hurricane Irene.  The Noahs of New Jersey (like this company) built their arks long ago and have already abandoned ship.  When you see our tough, Republican governor buddying up to Obama, you know it’s a pretty lost cause.  A governor’s got to do what a governor’s got to do.

No companies, no working residents, no jobs, no taxes.  Paterson was once a mill town, where silk was manufactured.  They can reconvert the mills to churn out flood money, instead.  The water goes over the mill wheel, and out comes the money, like magic.  At the moment, that’s about all New Jersey is producing – water.

The Towers of York - A 9/11 Ballad

I.                     Not Today (Yesterday)

Many yesterdays ago, in a feverish time,

When Hell bent the world in a peaceful sign,

High over York rose a towering display.

Alas for that hope evil was born to betray.

At his birth seers warned, “The end of the world is today.”

Travel’d we there to gaze at the sight,

To witness this twin silver monument to might.

It soared to the clouds, to conquer the sky.

While others exclaimed, I only could sigh,

“Shadows fall over a day far from today.”

Fearfully I stared at the façade’s Gothic arch,

Then up the sleek girders gusted by March.

“What think you,” asked they, “of buildings so tall?”

Said I, with a shudder, “York’s Towers shall fall.”

“How say you so, miss?!  They rose only today!”

“Peevish nonsense,” cried they, “from a girl of thirteen!

‘Tis but dizzy heights imagination has seen.”

Dazzling towers I’d view’d that rose to great heights.

But no pinnacle had crush’d the heart with such fright.

“The Towers will fall!  I’ve seen enough for today!”

A bright future those slender arches belied;

Beyond their façade lay the ruins of pride.

Above their cold shadow, silver met the gold sun.

But its weight poorly borne, frail beauty’d succumb.

“Pray God, should they fall, let it not be today!”

Up we sped through the tower, my mind ill at ease,

Fears foster’d in magnitude by brothers who tease.

In mind’s eye did approach future terror on wing.

‘Twixt heav’n and earth, no refuge to cling.

Mist-vanish’d fate’s bolt would not strike today.

“How come you to think of such gloomy disaster?

Give us some reason for this Armageddon of plaster!”

“Perhaps an explosion, like the ones that wrack Eire;

A bomb in the basement, or maybe the spire.”

“One tower may explode, but not both in one day!”

“To accomplish that feat would need an army of men

To go unseen from floor one to one hundred and ten!”

“A storm then,” tried I, “with a wind of such power

To shatter the glass and send it down in a shower.”

“The sun shines brightly!  There’s no danger today!”

“Its supports are outside,” one yielded, “’tis true.

A fire could melt it, but could a fire melt two?

For lightning to strike twice would be quite a plan.”

Said I, in a caution, “Don’t underestimate Man.”

“We promise the Towers won’t fall – not today!”

Man builds empires up to the sky;

The physical materials God does supply.

But the material world’s the Devil’s to rule.

Against Man’s ambition, he plots chaos most cruel.

Man can’t reach Heaven with towers of steel

Nor trade for God’s love by making a deal.

Yet York’s Towers won’t fall by God’s loving hand -

The spiteful Devil shall knock down our castles of sand.

“The Towers won’t fall.  What more can we say?!”

Away in disgust my audience drew.

‘Twas impossible for a girl to know what I knew.

Not for my pleasure did I divine the Unknown.

Sight came unbidden, unwillingly shown.

“They won’t see the truth.  Oh no, not today.”

II.                  Signs of the Times (Today)

Now it’s today and people are weeping.

From the inferno, the hopeless are desperately leaping.

One tower wobbles, wagging its finger,

“Calamity’s upon you, dare not you linger!”

At Hudson’s last bridge, they look’d for a sign;

Their target in sight, with Fate they align’d.

Like a bird in whose reflection an enemy glares,

They slamm’d through the glass with their innocent fares.

To fight such a blaze needs an army of men

To climb from floor one to one hundred and ten.

Ten claxons clang for the World Trade Center;

Into the fiery maw, only the bravest dare enter.

Heroes and victims pass on the stairs.

Fate’s the precarious splitting of hairs.

Gasping for breath and toting their gear,

Those who go up must set aside fear.

York halts in horror to stare at the sight;

Billows of smoke turning day into night.

How, on this perfect day of sky blue,

Could tragedy strike, such hatred spew?

Stop up your ears to the thunder of rubble,

To the explosion of rage bursting our bubble.

To safety the panicking crowds madly run

From the hideous cloud that wipes out the sun.

All that is left of the towers I saw

Is the skeleton clinging to life by a claw.

Nothing is left to bury the dead.

Their ashes have buried the city instead.

The shadow of silence befalls our great land;

All music and laughter – even our band.

Not a bird, not a plane, not a single sweet note.

Every sound but crying has the enemy smote.

Six weeks has it taken for peace to return.

Even now, the smoldering ruins still burn.

“How could this happen?” ask we, wringing our hands.

“America was surely the safest of lands?”

Long is the story of sorrow and grief,

Of how America fail’d to keep out the thief.

Of closing our eyes and our ears to the fey.

Of saying too often, “Oh no, not today.”

Into our country fanatics were welcome,

No matter how dang’rous their activities made them.

Political correction corrupted the rules,

Allowing them to march onto our planes with their tools.

The mind guards fast an obstinate gate

Against the grim specter of unthinkable Fate.

When safe in the present Men warnings ignore,

The future’s a battlefield scarred by war.

III.               The Test of Time (Tomorrow)

The long year has passed and now it’s tomorrow.

Fate’s spared us to finish the tale of our sorrow.

The fall of York’s Towers caus’d the breaking of hearts,

Suffr’d even by those with the smallest of parts.

On that terror-fill’d day, York stood not alone;

Against other symbols was death being flown.

Anxiously, Americans scanned the blue sky

For zealots who were praying to Allah to die.

For three harrow’d days after the fall,

O’er York hung bleak a dust-poisn’d pall.

For three days more, the cold North Wind flew,

Restoring the sky to that morning’s true blue.

In funerals and ceremonies to honor the dead,

Sad songs were sung and eulogies read.

The Towers deflated to a six-story pile;

An anguish to clear in air cindr’d vile.

One sleepy dawn came a low distant thunder;

With a roar it rent the stricken silence asunder.

The eagle was bound for strife-ridden lands,

Bringing justice’s wrath to those hid in the sands.

The grief-stupor’d nation awakened at last.

The Ground Zero flag flew from Ted’s mast.

No more taken for granted the stars and the stripes;

Freedom’s banner wav’d defiant in all sizes and types.

On went the descent of the now-aging year,

Yet the season of fall was loth to appear.

Springtime’s red robin, driven off by fall’s crows,

Returned to the garden and sang in the boughs.

Straight through the winter robin sang a bright tune.

The rose bloomed at Christmas as though it were June.

A balm of peace offr’d at the gift-giving season.

God’s mercy and pity transcend human reason.

Travel’d we back to gaze at the site;

Gone is the twin silver monument to might.

Where once lofty arches loomed fragile but fair,

Naught now remains but columns of air.

‘Tis lighter and warmer, but the shadows are chill;

Disbelief and mute awe do the empty void fill.

In the ruins the echoes of footsteps still clatter

And the wind carries whispers of long-ago chatter.

“Sixty years when I’m old?” asks a young voice from the past.

“Will that be how long York’s Towers will last?”

“More like thirty;” says the elder, “’tis I who’ll be gray.”

Twenty-nine years and six months, give or take an odd day.

When view’d from the past, tomorrow’s but today.

Always in mem’ry may York’s Towers arise;

Remember their splendor and not their demise.

May those who were lost be found in God’s glory

And granted a happier end to this story.

The Towers of York – A Ballad

Copyright Ó2001 Carole J. Rafferty