by Susan Budig
Member since:
February 16, 2006

Not Counted - a tritina

November 03, 2009 01:08 PM EST
views: 74 | rating: 10/10 (7 votes) | comments: 18

Not Counted 

I am not on the list of names
Mournfully read each September eleventh
Won’t someone weep for me? 

Hunched in a bundle of rags, that was me
Sleeping off the vodka, forgetting my name
One of the guys, one of eleven 

Other derelicts, maybe more than eleven
But what’s it matter, no one heard me
No one remembers my name 

Me and eleven cardboard box dwellers, along with our names, died, too.

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Comments: 18

Ann M. (Site Scryer) Nov 3, 2009, 1:22pm EST
Oh, Susan, you're twisting the knife again! This reminds me of Arleen Hodge's story about the homeless man who committed suicide in an abandoned barn. It also reminds me of the current LYR post about leaving footprints in this life. Why are only those who leave "good" footprints memorialized?

Thank for sharing with Gather's Best.
Ann M. (Site Scryer) Nov 3, 2009, 1:23pm EST
Now featured. I can't resist.
Atticus *. Nov 3, 2009, 1:33pm EST
Great tritina Susan, I love how loosely it fits together, like the ragged garments of the homeless, now clothed in catastrophic events. If not immortalized by a plaque, they are honored by your fine remembrance here. It is a beautiful piece. very touching.
JOHN BECK Nov 3, 2009, 3:07pm EST
Well said, Atticus.
Kathryn E. Nov 3, 2009, 3:21pm EST
I think of those in Boston, Montreal, NY and DC and Paris...


Featured in the Triple Name Club.
Warren Bennett Nov 3, 2009, 3:22pm EST
aww this is pretty darn good. Very touching too.
vivi emerson Nov 3, 2009, 5:08pm EST
I liked this...especially that the words you chose expressed a voice that was authentically different from your own. The vocabularly kept simple, the rhythm and cadence also not the same as your other pieces.
Donna Kirby Nov 3, 2009, 5:09pm EST
Thank you for opening my eyes to this angle, Susan. I had never thought of 9/11 from a homeless person's viewpoint. Having just visited the site in early October of this year, the memory of that day is etched even more clearly in my mind. From now on, this angle will be included in my thoughts of that day. Not to go to a gloomy mood here, I always think of the homeless that, "This was once someone's baby, someone's son or daughter, someone's father, mother or relative." I always think that everyone deserves much better than that. Great post, thank you!
David W. Nov 3, 2009, 5:12pm EST
Stark and dramatic. You are an artist with words.
libramoon C. Nov 3, 2009, 5:16pm EST
If a discounted person dies alone in the gutter, do they make a sound?
Barbara H. Nov 3, 2009, 9:24pm EST
Yes! Susan has made note of the sound she heard and so we hear too.
Susan Budig Nov 3, 2009, 5:25pm EST
Thanks for your verbal clapping. I wrote this within the past year during a writing exercise at my bi-monthly writers' group. I can't remember if it's ekphrastic (the room where we meet is filled with framed art) or prompted by specific words. I'll ask my fellow writers this Saturday if anyone remembers.
Richard Thuss Nov 3, 2009, 6:21pm EST
tritina, sestina, villanelle: I have so much to learn in my old age. Thank God I have a good teacher. Very nice Susan.
Janice F. Nov 3, 2009, 10:50pm EST
Beautiful and incredibly touching Susan, so very true and that is the saddest part of all.
Dano C. Nov 4, 2009, 2:43am EST
Particular people congregate,
their love and laughs to share.
In summer there is nature,
in winter cold despair.

Liquer on the palate,
no shelter for the night.
Frostbitten morning,
cold weather respite.

Ode to snowbirds.
Michael Fishman Nov 4, 2009, 6:40am EST
I like this a lot, Susan. When I think of 9/11 my thoughts go to things like terrorism, fear, firefighters, politics, the Patriot Act and someone monitoring the things I check out of the library, stuff like that. I never stop and think of individual people very much or this one particular segment of the population. This is a very powerful poem and by the ninth line, also very emotional.
Jason Hillenburg Nov 4, 2009, 5:13pm EST
An excellent poem written from a difficult point of view. Having known many men such as the narrator of this poem, I can say that you have captured the desperate futility of lives ending in figurative train wrecks with clarity and poetic grace. It even lightly strikes the chord of resentment without belaboring it too much. Well done.

Thanks for sharing with all of us.
Susan Budig Nov 4, 2009, 5:24pm EST
I'm truly humbled by the positive, affirming comments. I just re-read the poem and wondered if you understood that these eleven homeless died because the Towers went down *on* them as they sheltered nearby in an alley or doorstoop.

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