Poetry

pixabay photo

By

Carrie Magness Radna

Remembering 9/11

All the clouds sat down

in Columbus Circle

during the morning rush.

Everyone was strangely quiet,

all the birds screamed: “Hush!”

But the 17th Day of Remembrance

for 9/11 is now over; prayers were said,

loved ones comforted, songs sung.

At 50th Street, changing from the C to E,

I had to continue downtown to travel up—

it pointed towards World Trade Center,

my heart was suddenly hung

out to dry in a humid place.

People on the train were solemn, respectful, some had tears in their eyes—

disguised as boredom across their faces.

Wish I could wake up,

and that the world’s madness would eventually stop.

Carrie Magness Radna

Carrie Magness Radna is an archival audiovisual cataloger at the New York Public Library, a singer, a lyricist-songwriter, one-time food blogger (The Hungry Librarian, at http://hungrylibrarian.me) and a poet who loves to travel.

Her poems have previously appeared in the Oracular Tree, and will be published in Nomad’s Choir and Muddy River Poetry Review. She won third prize for “The tunnel” (category: Words on the Wall: All-Genre Prompt) at the 69th annual Philadelphia Writers’ Conference (2017), where she attended workshops taught by the renowned poets Yolanda Wisher and Chrys Tobey, and has hung out with the irresistible and irreverent Mad Poets of Philadelphia, headed by Eileen D’Angelo.

Born in Norman, Oklahoma, she is a member of the Greater New York Music Library Association (GNYMLA), and is a member/have read/workshopped for the New York Poetry Forum, Parkside Poets, Riverside Poets, Brownstone Poets and Nomad’s Choir. When she’s not performing classical choral works with Riverside Choral Society or New Year’s Eve performances with the New York Festival Singers, or writing art song lyrics with her choir buddies, or penning her own folk songs for her chorus’ cabarets, or traveling, she lives with her husband Rudolf in Manhattan.