Fear is the passenger in my front seat

Fear taps my shoulder

in the bathroom, at my desk

Fear goes to bed with me at night

Fear is a jet overhead

after two days of grounded quiet

just gulls and jays

Fear (and I know this is wrong)

is the Moslem woman swathed in her black bur’qa

her eyes barely detectable

What’s that bulge beneath her cloak?

Fear is the blank check we’ve given Bush

to destroy this implacable, invisible foe,

dispersed in so many lands,

who wants

not our land or our treasure,

just our lives,

Our deaths, I fear,

are their ticket

to instant paradise.

Remember who holds the trigger, but first….

Welcome to Fortress America

where Fear Reigns.

………CJLanger…….9/16/01 (after the WTC collapse)