Consuming Loss

 ---- This was written as a memory of 911

Something doesn’t feel right. The soundless campus is empty. Feeble hands reach to hide gasps, anguished eyes glaze while hunched shoulders slump to cradle wounded spirits. Intensely captivated, the fragile room maintains its silence. Suicides plunging from the roof envelop the conscience of the unstructured assembly. In assaulted denial, the camera follows a business man twisted and bent floating down to the astonished street below. A frightened secretary anxiously jumps as her contorted body cruelly hits the side of the apathetic building. It is impossible to absorb. There is no frame of reference. With the longing to understand there is also a desire to passionately flee from this intolerant scene so painful to observe.

In the callous square box frame, a wayward plane directly aims defiantly into the second tower. Deep moans and sighs echo throughout the room. Human statues permeate the lounge that has abandoned its calling to relaxation and peace. Glaring at the malevolent sight, the edges of the dull gray building achingly crumble. The infuriating tick of the clock mockingly rips families apart from their cherished loved ones. As vindictive dust ascends towards the innocent sky, throats are grasped in spontaneous grief to provide some kind of unknown comfort.

Rocking in compassionate empathy for those trapped in their ruthless iron prison, whispers of prayers fill each consuming crevice. The malicious inferno mercilessly clings to the steel and paned glass begging to uphold one last moment of dignity. But the building surrenders to the intensity and magnitude of its captor. The unforgiving lens clenches and smothers the last seconds of will and hope. In mass unity of despair they leap together. But there is nothing to cushion or hold them as witnesses hopelessly plead for inexplicable safety.

Loss threatens to devour the spiritual core. Death is not a friend. Definitions no longer matter. Rhythmic phrases lack wisdom or kindness. Grief takes what does not belong to him and leaves sorrow with no comforter.

But God is greater than our circumstances. He is more powerful than suffering. His purposes are larger than our hopes. In Him there is fullness of life even in relentless ardent agony. In stillness, God still speaks. He still holds. He still loves. 

God reaches to embrace wounded spirits to comfort even the endless void of heartache. He is strength in mourning and peace in sadness. In pain, God reveals Himself with clarity and simplicity.