I never choose fruit

[kaxtar1]

Every lunchtime I slip away,
sit on my park bench meal deal,
coffee with a shot of vanilla,
sandwiches and a chocolate biscuit
or fruit.

The city drones regardless,
a backdrop to my tranquil moment.
Today is different, it taps for my attention,
vocal chords that wont hold still
they shout and scream,
blowing panic, man and machine
that tumble down crowded streets
quicker with each step,
rubble falls around me

I feel like a drunk woken at a party
stumbling to process the marker-pen scene,
drowning sirens are seen not heard
dust has its hands down my throat.
The rubble turns to burning bodies,
thumping to the ground,
splitting branches from the trees.
My mind had told my legs to run
long before it told me.

To be quite honest, the original meaning I took from this poem was that the same old circumstances of your daily ritual turned into a suffocating nightmare.  This doesn't feel like 9/11 (I wasn't there, so take everything that I say with a large grain of salt).  That being said, I don't like the outward focus for such an inward moment, this was your damned lunch man!  Feel the rubble in your rickety bones, feel the crackling of burning bodies on the pavement as fire crackers on your first fourth of July, a deathly rain shower of hopes, dreams, and dust.   However, how you described the lack of comprehension in the various sirens?  Juicy.  Like the sirens being seen not heard?  Creamed my pants a wee bit.  It is very clever and patters along nicely but lacks the dialogue changing doesn't amplify meaning, it confuses it.  Also pull me back to the lunch theme in the end.

Honestly, overall I really liked the poem but it wasn't connecting with me.