Ode to Katrina

August 2005

As I watched the news of the South, I heard the story of a man, with tears in his eyes, telling a story of losing his wife, through his own hands, and I put myself in his place and I began to write..

"Please," she said, with deepening fear rising all around her, the currents in her eyes told me something was frightening wrong, "Please, don't let go of my hand" as the water became to strong for even my hard grip, to hold my lifelong partner from dangling off the only part of the roof that had not been flooded.  And the fury of all the things that felt like the wrath of unloving God tore our grasp apart and the torrential rains and the flying debris and the blinding wind that had left us immoveable and prone on the slick rooftop was all I had as I wasn't even able to lift my head to watch her float away.  I yelled into the darkness with no avail for her and then I shouted, "Dear, hang on, hang on for your life." 

Already feeling like a failure, I could do nothing but hold onto what was left of our brick chimney on top of our dream home, the one that we had built together, and here I was without her, both of us taken into the unknown abyss.  And I sat there as the tears mixed with the crushing pain as a piece of flying wood hurled itself into my face, rendering me lifeless, at the mercy of the storm.  As the hurricane let up and I began to open my sand blasted, blurry eyes to the complete destruction around me, I felt my head with my hand, the place of my injury, and noticed the dried blood in my hands, but my attention turned to the sight before me.  My neighbors bodies began to float by my house and my perfect neighborhood on Chestnut Street was unrecognizable.  My dreams shattered as I clawed my way to the other side of the roof as my mind played my worst fears; she was gone.  A stark realization shuttered my body, and I wondered:  What do I do now?  Where do I go?  Where will help come from?  Where was the music and the laughter and the people with the beaming eyes in the street?  What harsh reality had replaced those scenes in my mind?  Was I really seeing all of this?

All of these thoughts and memories faded onto the back of my mind as I heard the screams shrieking for help passing by me.  With open eyes, I looked and saw a young black woman, clutching with one hand an elderly black woman, as they floated by me, bobbing their heads and free arms above and below the water, in some weird synchronized swimming dance.  My own feelings aside, I thought to myself, if I do not help these people they will surely die, and I looked around at my own self-indulgence and realized that there was nothing left for me here.  It was to the currents of the water and those victims that need me that I cast my life's work into now.  If not for the blistering sun, the jump into the water would of been a shock, but this entire experience had already dulled my senses and took me to another place.  I grabbed the closest piece of wood and began to swam hard directly at them, letting the current do most of the work, I grabbed them and like a move I used to use as a lifeguard on the beaches of the Jersey Shore in 1970's, I scooped them up onto the wood.  Clutching them in my now empty arms, we half-swam, half-floated together until we came to an area downtown.  The current through the side streets became too strong for my legs and arms to control, and I decided that it was here and now to lose my precious cargo.  I pushed the two woman to safety in the clutches of some men on a balcony with outstretched hands and as I pushed her, she turned to me with lovely blue eyes and said, "Savior," but it was me who looked up to the sky, and whispered, "save me."

It was like I was on a scenic tour through some Disney Land floating ride, but this was not the type of ride I wanted to be on.  Why did I not just leave?  Why did I not heed the warnings?  Too late for all of these questions now and the questions stopped once again as the water began to become shallower and shallower deeper downtown.  It was all the same as my feet touched the street pavement, all the same destruction, all the same looks on all the same faces, heartache and pain.  So many questions to answer or to ask and I just kept waking as if I was in another country, I surveyed the scene and I walked in a daze past all the looters and the men and women yelling for someone to help them, clutching babies and small children, and elderly men and woman collapsed on the side of the streets, some alive, and some dead.  Hungry, tired, wet, and on the brink of giving up myself, I prayed a miracle for hope, for perseverance and the ability to continue on.  I knew deep down that I would survive cause I always had, but I knew I could help others who had little chance to.  What a bleak set of circumstances we were all in as all the dear people hung on, hung on for their lives.  And I began to think that I just wanted to be somewhere else, but failure and excuses would not save me, or others.  I had to find my wife, and I had to give everything left to find her and to stir some hope in others and to shower love; because I know, she would not have asked anything else of me.  As I look to the sky before I set on my way, mixed with the smoke from the fires, and the pieces of debris still stirring about was the first sun that had broken through the clouds since the storm ended, and I knew, that on top of all this water, was a small glimmer and a glint of chance.