Three minutes before nine on a cold, crisp December,

Not the screeching of tires and throttled, strained gasps, or the tearing of fragments,

Were so much as heard.

The shattering of glass, and the overturn of thoughts,

Remained silently still, and so remarkably mute,

As they cracked within impact, fractured and frail.

The door was contorted, its body so bowed,

And though to its hinges it stuck,

It bled condensation of dark, busted fumes.

The peak of midday had not yet been reached,

Though night had befallen in the form of black smoke.

Vision, now thwarted, was laced in sheer pain,

And voices imprisoned behind cold, static lips.

Thoughts lay in clouds of bleary fatigue,

As the thump of pale hearts crawled up to dry throats.

Time had no measure, for it ceased to pulse,

Its muscle compressed and its ticker too slivered.

Barring the presence of a good, unscathed clock,

Minutes were stagnant, a numberless measure.

On that cold, crisp December, eight minutes were left

In the wake of a charter bus that barreled our way.

Trapped in that moment that dauntingly walked,

In pieces and fragments of our little, wrecked world,

Our lives may have hung in many a question,

But so did a thought—in faith and in hope—,

Of a sweet, ballad, tune:

 

“Miracles in December.”