Other Souls
Janet Kuypers
6/26/15
Other souls
litter history books.
- - -
I wish I was Joan of Arc,
carrying her banner in battle,
giving Divinely-inspired advice
to the men under her command.
And I wish I was burned
at the stake for my beliefs.
As the flames rose
to her Roman nose*,
I wonder if she ever knew
of her ultimate power.
- - -
I wish I was on the Titanic
(that sounds so like me —
I’d be the rich elite
on the first cruise
across the ocean)...
I wish I’d gone down,
gone down with them.**
I don’t care
what passenger I am,
the point is that
people will study the disaster
that I was in
for centuries.
Books will be written.
movies will be box office hits.
All from me being
in the wrong place
at the wrong time.
- - -
I wish I were my ancestors,
Marie, Aafje, Petronella, Johanna —
I wish I was in the resistance
like them
to save Jews from the SS
in World War Two.
I never lived
through their struggles
but I’d gladly take their place
and fight for something,
even if it meant
being killed by the Nazis,
for what,
for trying to save lives.
- - -
I wish I was on flight 175,
just another one of my trips
across the country,
I’m getting used to airplanes,
it’s actually quite a nice morning.
Come two thousand one,
come all the damage I have seen
so far in my life,
maybe this would be a way to go.
I haven’t seen
the World Trade Centers
since 1995, wow, what a view
this flight is giving me.
Maybe I’d hear
from a neighboring passenger’s
phone call about the hijackers.
No matter.
I’d see the inferno
of the North Tower
before I’d take part
in a big inferno myself.
Some time to panic,
and then,
like that,
it’s over.
Years later,
my name would be
cut through metal
memorialized around the fountains
on the once tallest buildings.
Yeah, it would be quick,
but people would come
to this New York intersection
by appointment only
and run their hands
around the letters
of my name.
After all this pain,
they wouldn’t forget.
- - -
Other souls
litter history books.
Some may have been great,
some, as I said,
may have been
at the wrong place
at the wrong time.
And after I’ve been attacked,
and after I’ve been almost killed,
what.
I’ve pieced myself back together,
I’ve screamed my stories from rooftops,
I’ve etched my words into stone.
And no one hears me.
And if they do,
no one will remember.
* The Smiths, “Bigmouth Strikes Again”
** Morrissey, “Munich Air Disaster 1958”
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