September 11th 2006

The baby has started smiling and it is great to watch her slowly gain control of her body. She smiled when I kissed her as I was leaving to go to work this morning. It made my day! However I'm not sure she meant it as she immediately followed up that smile by clenching her fist and proceeded to punch herself in the face!

The 5th anniversary of 9/11 is fast approaching and every morning as I get off the train at Ground Zero I am noticing more and more TV satellite trucks parked across the street. Today they were holding a rally for the 9/11 first responders who are sick and dying from the toxic dust they inhaled cleaning up the WTC site. The City of New York has shamed itself in pretending these people don't exist and the federal Government were the ones who said the air was good enough to breathe so where do the loyal members of NYPD and FDNY turn? Nowhere left but to fight it out in the media. I watched the speakers for a while, all dolled up for the TV cameras and I felt pretty sick myself.

It's such a shame, 9/11 will be remembered as a seminal event in the history of the world but it seems like the generation that actually lived through it has learned nothing - other than the fact that our leaders are lying murderers and cheats.

It feels strange to be in NYC on September 11th. The day is really burned into your mind and you remember strange things. I remember how blue the sky was, the smell of airline fuel drifting across NY harbor to Brooklyn, miles away from the site. I remember Abdul, our Lebanese next door neighbor standing on his porch with his son. He was horrified. His kids played on the street outside our house all the time. After 9/11 the kids were never allowed out on their own again.

I listened to the song "Radio Baghdad" by Patti Smith today. This song says it all to me.
.

Suffer not Your neighbor's affliction
Suffer not Your neighbor's paralysis
But extend your hand Extend your hand
Lest you vanish in the city And be but a trace
Just a vanished ghost And your legacy
All the things you knew Science, mathematics, thought
Severely weakened Like irrigation systems
In the tired veins forming From the Tigris and Euphrates
In the realm of peace All the world revolved
All the world revolved Around a perfect circle
City of Baghdad City of scholars
Empirical humble Center of the world
City in ashes City of Baghdad
City of Baghdad Abrasive aloof

Oh, in Mesopotamia Aloofness ran deep
Deep in the veins of the great rivers
That form the base Of Eden
And the tree The tree of knowledge
Held up its arms To the sky
All the branches of knowledge All the branches of knowledge
Cradling Cradling
Civilization In the realm of peace
All the world revolved Around a perfect circle
Oh Baghdad Center of the world
City of ashes With its great mosques
Erupting from the mouth of god Rising from the ashes like
a speckled bird Splayed against the mosaic sky
Oh, clouds around We created the zero
But we mean nothing to you You would believe
That we are just some mystical tale We are just a swollen belly
That gave birth to Sinbad, Scheherazade We gave birth
Oh, oh, to the zero The perfect number
We invented the zero And we mean nothing to you
Our children run through the streets
And you sent your flames Your shooting stars
Shock and awe Shock and awe
Like some, some Imagined warrior production
Twenty-first century No chivalry involved
No Bushido

Oh, the code of the West Long gone
Never been Where does it lie?
You came, you came Through the west
Annihilated a people And you come to us
But we are older than you You come you wanna
You wanna come and rob the cradle
Of civilization And you read yet you read
You read Genesis You read of the tree
You read of the tree Beget by god
That raised its branches into the sky Every branch of knowledge
Of the cradle of civilization

Of the banks of the Tigris and the Euphrates
Oh, in Mesopotamia Aloofness ran deep
The face of Eve turning What sky did she see
What garden beneath her feet The one you drill
You drill Pulling the blood of the earth
Little droplets of oil for bracelets Little jewels
Sapphires You make bracelets
Round your own world We are weeping tears
Rubies We offer them to you
We are just Your Arabian nightmare
We invented the zero But we mean nothing to you
Your Arabian nightmare

City of stars City of scholarship
Science City of ideas
City of light City
City of ashes That the great Caliph
Walked through His naked feet formed a circle
And they built a city A perfect city of Baghdad
In the realm of peace And all the world revolved
And they invented And they mean nothing to you
Nothing to you Nothing

Go to sleep Go to sleep my child
Go to sleep And I'll sing you a lullaby
A lullaby for our city A lullaby of Baghdad
Go to sleep Sleep my child
Sleep Sleep...
Run Run...

You sent your lights Your bombs
You sent them down on our city Shock and awe
Like some crazy t.v. show

They're robbing the cradle of civilization
They're robbing the cradle of civilization
They're robbing the cradle of civilization

Suffer not The paralysis of your neighbor
Suffer not But extend your hand

"Radio Bagdad" by Patti Smith