kragore | Sep. 2nd, 2011

Man was Made to Mourn: A Dirge

Many and sharp the num'rous ills
Inwoven with our frame!
More pointed still we make ourselves
Regret, remorse, and shame!
And man, whose heav'n-erected face
The smiles of love adorn, -
Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn!
- Robert Burns, 1784

Suddenly, it seems, ten years has come and gone - 10 solid years, and we remember exactly where we were that morning.
People have joined us - others have parted. The cycle of life continued.

Ours is an age of pervasive media, and that day it was no different. Immediate, all consuming, projected onto the screens of our mind in endless, senseless loop. There was no way to escape it short of unplugging and not talking to anyone. If you buried yourself in a remote dark place and never came back, you had a chance.

Here we are 10 years later, battered by the media again.
I find myself haunted.

There is a picture.
"Falling Man".
When I think of that day, I think of Falling Man.
There are guesses, but we don't know exactly who he was. A sound engineer, a lawyer? Does it matter? We know exactly when and how he died. We all witnessed it.
It was hitchcockian. No violence; it was serine and off camera. Shocking in it's quietness. You knew what was coming - but knowing didn't change the outcome.
To see the still images, you'd think this was a movie effect, and that he was going to pull out of his dive and *fly.* Spread the arms held so tightly to his side, and break the ties of gravity drawing him down, down, down.
If there was ever a time when the latent superhero power of flight was going to show it's self, I deeply and truly believe Falling Man would have proved it's existence.
With so many people watching, willing, hoping, and praying that his decent would not end the way we all knew it would -

I've seen Falling Man a lot these past few weeks. Everything about that day for me is balled up with him. The anxious, ragged breath, confusion, fear, suspicion and sinking dread. Along with it, the hope, will, and the primal desire to survive. The choices that are not choices, not when the end result is the same. The empty guise of control.

Something rises in me when I see Falling Man. It's an unnameable horror that encompasses all of the above.
I want to forget, but there's an unspoken duty to remember.
Witness.

Falling Man, I'll be forced to remember the anniversary of your death for the rest of my life. The day that Everything and Nothing changed. You're my JFK, Falling Man. A symbol of the innocence of my generation being literally dashed to the ground.

While I wish you an easy rest every year, I know that will never happen. At least not until you've passed out of generational memory. All I can do is hope your loved ones (if you had loved ones), remember you fondly, and that is enough.