On September 11, 2001, I lived in Williamsburg, Virginia, and served as an Associate Rector at historic Bruton Parish Episcopal Church. We had our weekly staff meeting that morning and even finished proofing the bulletins before the clergy piled into a car and drove to the house of the college chaplain to watch the news there, hoping that doing so would make us less confused about what was happening. But that was not to be the case, and we saw the rest of the events of that terrible day unfold before us on live television. Perhaps you did too.
Share your own memory here in one verse with five syllables in the first line, seven syllables in the second line, and five syllables in the third line. Mine comes from the days that followed 9/11, when there was no commercial air traffic. The silence was eerie. Yet, in a region of the country with a heavy military presence, it wasn’t completely silent:
The skies were empty,
except for Lear jets marked with
stars — the generals.
Tumbleweed Almanac 
Went to sleep that night
thinking those I loved were safe.
Uncle Mike wasn’t.
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Our age of innocence died
that day with the second plane
then the truth was terrorism
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Beautiful Fall day
Until terror filled the skies
Freedom crashing down…
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First plane, how awful!
Second plane, oh my God, no!
Then the buildings fell…
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Stood in line at the
Red Cross in Winston-Salem
to bleed for strangers.
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One of my parishioners shared this memory:
We searched online. The
first plane hit, then the second.
Not an accident.
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watched the buildings fall
over and over again
on campus tv’s
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Naive high school self:
“What idiot pilot would…”
then the second plane hit.
Exchange student friend:
“I came here to find safety.”
Didn’t know what to say.
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