It was a remarkably silent thing.
No pall, no knell, no tolling bell,
 
no grey wolves howling at the moon,
no stampede to shake the salamanders
 
from their river rocks.  No women
knelt and keened, draining their sorrow
 
through knees and wails into the ground.
No gunshot, knockbacks, no gutting metal
 
bore through any concrete. No glass
symphonic as it shattered on a wall, no
 
dissonant tones, no vuvuzela belching
crowds into a frenzy. Nothing caterwauled
 
or called. I was there, and my voice fell out
as teeth in palms. You said nothing at all.

–Jen Stein