September 11, 2015

My Journey to God

Memory Composed Out of Dust

Days after flame ignited
all into dust and ash
I step out onto the front porch
twenty-four miles to the east
on an Island that is Long,
to find out what is that smell.

I inhale invisible particles of dust
that were man-made buildings
and human flesh and bone
and now the remains of spirit
that become part of me
which I carry inland
three years later
when I move to Indiana.

Six years beyond the return
west I compose this prayer
out of their spirit to remember
those who breathed with us.

By Norbert Krapf
 

(Norbert Krapf is a member of St. Mary Parish in Indianapolis and was the Indiana Poet Laureate from 2008-10. Krapf and his family were living on Long Island, N.Y., during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He wrote this poem in 2010.) †

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