35

Drivers out on the bridge
 Slowing down as they go through a lane shift
 Wires snap
 Concrete gives
 Metal twisting and
 Everything tumbling
 At the end of the work day
 Stuck in traffic, don't feel when the road sways
 Underneath
 Concrete gives
 Metal twisting and
 Everything tumbling
 To their partners and kids
 Don't suspect anything till the bridge splits
 Wires snap
 Concrete gives
 Metal twisting and
 Everything tumbling
 Down
 Where I sat I saw brake lights flash
 And I pictured them: all the people, their faces in free fall, the water beneath
 I pushed my palms against the table hard to see if it hurt
 Were it glass would I have shattered it?
 Could I battle every impulse to panic and then win
 Swim out through the metal twisting upward like a sculpture
 Or some terrible beast?
 People trapped in their cars
 Put both feet on the glass and then kick hard
 Water pours in
 Seatbelts twist
 River flowing and
 Everything going down
 People under the water line
 Workers sift through the wreckage of it, find
 Seatbelts stuck
 Water fills up
 River flowing and
 Everything going downstream
 On the dining room wall, I watched it
 Play in the reflection of the television
 The reversal in the mirror hung, I could see it all
 How the dust clouds gather color as they billow out
 Shades change shifting in the night
 From the lights atop an ambulance
 Like a firework's flash then that otherworldly glow
 In the smoke thrown in the aftermath blows
 Almost frozen for a moment there
 I could see it all
 Every dust cloud
 Shattered glass
 Billow out on the TV
 Wires snap
 And the concrete gives
 Metal twists up and onward
 I can see it all
 Every dust cloud
 Shattered glass
 Billow out on the TV
 Wires snap
 And the concrete gives in
 Metal twists up and onward I watch
 And I can see it all
 All the wreckage
 All the cars piled
 In the river and the rail yard
 The metal twists
 Wires snap
 Concrete blocks split
 And dangle from tie rods
 And metal twists up
 Wires sway
 When a breeze blows
 In the distant
 Sirens glow
 I can see it all
 Where they look for survivors
 Searchlights float
 Change the color of smoke clouds
 And shadows still fall
 People under the water
 People trapped in their cars
 Kick and try to get out
 People still with their seat belts on
 Pets they had in the back
 And car seats
 And I watch it on TV lying down here
 On the floor in the dining room, reversed in the mirror
 Where I know I'm not dreaming now
 But I know I've been sleeping
 I just don't know since when
 I only know that it's light outside
 I only know that the rent is still late
 When did they find out the concrete gave?
 When did they learn that the wires snapped?