Who There Once Was...: 9/11 Poems

September 11, 2001-a day etched into global memory. A day of horror, sorrow, and, for a moment, a rare unity through collective pain. 9/11 did not end with the collapse of the towers. It set in motion a global trend of terrorism, war, surveillance, and fear-patterns that continue to ripple across continents. From Afghanistan and Iraq to attacks in European cities, the wars between Israel and Gaza, and in Ukraine, their echoes are everywhere.

This small collection of poems was written on 22nd Street in Manhattan, the day the towers fell. It is my record of that moment, a quiet act of remembering. For twenty years, I was unable to look at these words. Only now do I feel ready to release them into the world.
These poems are not just about loss. They are a call to hold on to memory, truth, and the hope that we might finally choose a different path.

The poem "Man on a Horse" has been published in First Literary Review-East.

Sample:

The World Trade Center

Fired angel, spread your wings
Thousands of papers glittering
Lift aloft three thousand souls,
Leaving behind the empty goals.

And rubbish now materialized,
All vanity so oversized
Yet they ascend to higher spheres,
So, worry not and dry your tears.