Track List, Lyrics and Sound Clips

1. Firehouse (Christine Lavin)
2. Ground Zero (Jack Hardy)
3. It Hit Home (Suzanne Vega)
4. The Beauty of the Day (Jon Albrink)
5. You Never Know (Wendy Beckerman)
6. World Trade Center (Bob Hillman)
7. Louisa, From Her Window (Tim Robinson)
8. No Song (Richard Julian)
9. A Well Dressed Man (Dawn Landes)
10. On A Clear Day (Jack Hardy)
11. For Your Heart (Tim Robinson)
12. Boxcutters and Knives (Ina May Wool)
13. Communists (Bob Hillman)
14. The Skyline (Brian Rose)
15. Been Around (Jill Gerwirtz)
16. Spoonfed (Andy Germak)
17. Life Goes On (Wendy Beckerman)
18. Today (Noam Weinstein)
19. Never Forget (Amy Marie Keller)
20. When Mohammed Came to the Mountain (Frank Tedesso)

1. The Firehouse - Christine Lavin
Christine Lavin describes her local firehouse on the Upper West Side of New York, and how the mood changed from hope to despair as it became obvious that there were almost no survivors.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

I've lived in this neighborhood
for twenty-seven years
I know where to get good bagels
and exotic beers
the favorite sidewalk cafes
where locals like to eat
but I never paid attention to
the firehouse on this street

On one side is a parking lot
the other side a laundromat
across the street's a small boutique
where you could find an antique hat
on the corner an all-night diner
and discount drug store
where life goes on but not quite like
the way it did before

At first there was a slender thread
of optimistic hope
the digging went on round the clock
no one slept, but somehow coped
the photos of the missing men
were posted on the glass
of the red door where
we said a prayer
whenever we walked past

The wind shifted to the north
smoke filled our lungs
stung our eyes, burned our throats
left a bitter taste upon our tongues
we drank more than we should have
before we went to bed
everyone I know had nightmares
dreams all filled with dread

Day blurred into night then day
then night then day again
'missing' was the buzzword
too hard to think this was the end
for young men charging up the stairs
as hell came rolling down
though logic wasn't on our side
we thought they'd all be found

'Cause still there was this slender thread
of optimistic hope
the digging went on round the clock
no one slept, but somehow coped
the photos of the missing men
were posted on the glass
of the red door where
we said a prayer
whenever we walked past

Neighbors lit votive candles
laid flowers at that door
baked casseroles and homemade breads
but wished they could do more
the guys inside were grateful
but preferred to grieve alone
trained to save the lives of others
they could not save their own

Maybe next year the pain won't be as sharp
as it is today
though it will never completely go away
and we will talk in terms of
'before' and 'after' the attack
and wish more than anything
we could bring those brave men back

Reality sliced cleanly through
that slender thread of hope
the digging went on and on
some snapped
most of us still cope
the photos of the missing men
are missing from the glass
of the red door where
we say a prayer
whenever we walk past

[ mp3 sound clip ]

down to ground zero
with a rust colored rose
trying hard to close
that door
what have i opened
what have i done
that i'm not the one
it's for

down to ground zero
reduced to a number
that is not a number
any more
all talk of heroes
palls in the rubble
falls into trouble
at the core

chorus:
some choose death
and some choose life
and some have no choice at all
for some the indifference
of a conscious decision
is simply too close to call
simple mathematics
how many floors
how much time
flies
some people count
some count too much
uncounted as such
a lie

down at ground zero
a simple blade lies
with a color that dries
a rust colored rose

3. It Hit Home - Suzanne Vega
A collection of feelings, thoughts and observations from someone trying to make sense out of something seemingly senseless. I lived 15 blocks from the World Trade Center for 10 years, and my own brother had been working there, but called in sick on that day. So I am speaking literally as well as figuratively.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

no one admits they ever cry in public
lately we all do because we must
we do because a man stands at
the bottom of a building
looking for his brothers body in the dust

it hit home
it still does
it hits home

it makes me feel a pain within my person
like the breaking of a heart or of a bone
to think about that day and to imagine
every moment of my neighbors
in that devastated place close to my own

it hit home
it still does
it hits home

i am no great patriot
i never wear the flag
and i only sing the songs that I'm supposed to in a crowd
but if i travel to Chicago or just take the train downtown
i see the grace that's under pressure, that's what i report out loud

it hit home
it still does
it hits home

people when they're hungry become crazy
if its a baby or a nation we discuss
anger turns to action turns to danger
we get mean, and feel that living
isn't worth much, and it’s either them or us

it hit home
it still does
it hits home

i am no great patriot
i never wear the flag
and i only sing the songs that I'm supposed to in a crowd
but if i travel to Chicago or just take the train downtown
i see the grace that's under pressure, that's what i report out loud

it hit home
it still does
it hits home

4. The Beauty of the Day - Jon Albrink
A beautiful gentle song that asks the question: what if it never happened?

[ mp3 sound clip ]

The beauty of the day
A simple fact of grace
An end-of-summer day
She offers up her face
Prepares to take her place
With nameless lovely days

The beauty of the day
The message yet unplayed
The writing on the wall
Still hidden in the shade
Arrangements have been made
The journey has begun

But for now there's just the sun
Two rivers and the sea
Gentle arc of birds
Falling swift and free
Falling swift and free
Falling swift and free

Something like a bird
Something like a plane
The tiniest of sounds
Becomes a hurricane
And everyone will say
It all began that way

But for now there's just a hum
That might become a roar
Then slowly fade away
To what we had before
What we had before
What we had before
The beauty of the day

5.You Never Know - Wendy Beckerman
A poignant song about the preciousness of each life, especially in the face of a crisis.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

This is why I m counting one breath at a time
This is why I call the moment you come to mind
This is why I memorize your eyes before I go
Only going round the corner, but you never know

When the wind is cold it will not wait for sun
Underbellies of the leaves til mercy comes
This is why I m looking out the window
Wind might blow this way tomorrow, but you never know

This is why I m counting one life at a time
In the morning when the sun can make you blind
In the middle of the traffic moving slow
There might be somewhere to go, but you never know

6. World Trade Center - Bob Hillman
A view from a former New Yorker who was out of town.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

I saw the Trade Center fall on TV
Fall on TV
I turned it on coincidentally
It happened to you like it happened to me
I saw the Trade Center fall on TV

I see them falling again and again
Again and again
Over nine hundred times through the long weekend
Somewhere inside was a friend of a friend
I see them falling again and again

San Francisco’s perfect view
Of downtown New York City through a
Cable-ready picture tube
Calibrated expertly to
Render unequivocally
Something I don’t want to see
Have I seen everything?

I asked myself if it had to be real
Not really real
Special effects from a big movie deal
I had to think and I had to feel
I asked myself if it had to be real

Timing and dramatic flair
Anchormen with perfect hair
Planted in expensive chairs
Reading out our history
Crying intermittently
Front and center honesty
Have I seen everything?

I saw the Trade Center fall on TV
Fall on TV
I turned it on coincidentally
It happened to you like it happened to me
I saw the Trade Center fall on TV

7. Louisa, From Her Window - Tim Robinson
A fictional woman looks out of her apartment in Redhook, Brooklyn, and sees the aftermath of the attacks.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

A business memo flutters on
A smoky Redhook wind
While fragments of a summer turn
To starlings and ascend
Louisa, from her window
Sees a toothless gray dog yawn
At two old men from different worlds
Sacrificing pawns

Louisa tilts a bottle deep
Enough to drown her thoughts
A church spire shifts invisibly
Toward falling but is caught
By souls still in the firehouse
Who's glowing faces laugh
At something that a TV swore
Would never come to pass

The view through ships and wires and stone
The bones of here and now
Add them to your shadows and
Drag on from here somehow
(Louisa, from her window with her black hair falling down)

A wound across the water’s now
A bleeding a sawed-off sky
Louisa, from her window cries
Among what’s lost was mine
The traffic set below the scene
Is jammed but underway
As knights fly from their castles
As the bishops claim the day

Chorus:

8. No Song - Richard Julian
A song that explores the futility of words to describe what happened on that day.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

the stark
reality
defies
poetry
it mocks
this melody
there is no song
there is no song

murder
in the air
you can't escape
it's everywhere
it's more
than the senses can bear
there is no song
there is no song

no, not this time
no, not this time
no scheming rhyme
not this time
not this time

as sure as time
passes by
this pall will lift
and singers will try
but they will fail
and their songs will lie
there is no song
there is no song

no, not this time...

9. A Well Dressed Man - dawn Landes
dawn Landes is one of the younger members of the Songwriter’s Exchange. This song covers one of the most horrifying aspects of the attacks; the “jumpers”, as they were called by the firemen and newspapermen on the scene. It was adapted from a poem by Frank Tedesso.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

I wont speak of it
I quit the stars
and I quit the rain
(eyelashes seemed like petals to me just the other night)
can a human animal be transformed by rhyme?
or must a blaze always be involved...
who would invent such a question?
I am almost a song
I am almost a dog
I am diminished by my words
It hurts
to see a well-dressed man, falling
there goes a well-dressed man falling out of his life

As long as the smallest thing that dreams, does
I will because (because, because)
as Long as there is slightly visible Poetry, Light
Light, Light, Light
I am calling out to light
I am calling out to life
and to the well-dressed man, falling
To the well-dressed man falling
I see a well-dressed man falling
I'm calling out to life
I am calling out to life

10. On a Clear Day - Jack Hardy
A man remembers his brother. Jeff Hardy worked on the 101st floor of World Trade Tower #1, as a chef.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

on a clear day
you can see for miles
you can see for miles
almost say from coast to coast
on a clear day
you can follow the sunset
follow the sunset
all the way back home

on a clear day
the sunrise behind us
sunrise behind us
lights up these canyon walls
on a clear day
it reflects off of our blind side
reflects off our blind side
the blazing colors of fall

in the autumn
the wind plies the northway
wind plies the northway
with a sudden chill and moan
in the autumn
it comes down the Hudson river
follows the Hudson river
on its way back home

on a clear day
the clouds look like smoke
clouds look like smoke
as they tower over here
on a clear day
when autumn leaves are burning
autumn leaves are burning
my eyes fill with tears

on a clear day
i'll never not be mindful
never not be mindful
that it was on a day like this
on a clear day
it's not that any hindsight
not that any hindsight
could make it harder to miss

on a clear day i pray
he never saw it coming
never saw it coming
as he plied his work alone
on a clear day
if there's anyone left to pray to
anyone to pray to
i pray it brought him home

11. For Your Heart - Tim Robinson
A song for a friend who lost his brother, and an offering of comfort.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

All of these blues are fallen sky
The answer to who? turns out is why?
And I have nothing shaped like solace but to say

I can take you to lunch and lend an ear
Buy you some time with a deep black beer
If god returns I’d even swallow pride and pray

For your heart, may it mend
May you laugh loud again

Cruel is a word that lacks the weight
To tether the vicious cloud of fate
That has come twice now to steal your blood away

Soon now the fall will paint the woods
And round where you live the walking’s good
So give me a call if another voice might smooth the way

For your heart, may it heal
May you smile wide and real

Sing when the tears give way to words
You of the grave symbolic birds
As always teach us something with your pain

I’ve got a baseball and two gloves
I’ve got a brother’s banged up love
If that's what you need lets stand in a field and play a game

For your heart, may it mend
May you laugh loud again for your heart.

12. Boxcutters and Knives - Ina May Wool
Ina May Wool points out the ingenuity of the terrorists and simplicity of their tools, versus our technology.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

Boxcutters and knives
Hatred and flight instruction
A chance to die for something
I heard it on the news
This is what they used

Bomb threats and manuals
Fake id's and freedom of movement
Humiliation brewing
Nothing left to lose
This is what they used

Stealth bombers/F16's
Hundreds of thousands of men
We need to protect and
We need to defend
Consider what they used

Boxcutters and knives
And anonymity
Disintegrated countries
The fuel, the fire, the fuse
This is what they used

13. Communists - Bob Hillman
Bob Hillman explores a world with changed priorities after September 11th.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

Communists are no longer dangerous
They’re not even close to the top of the list
We have cybercriminals
Bioterrorists
Letter bombers
Stalkers
Paramilitary groups

But in 1917 they were righteous and they were mean
And they executed anyone who dared oppose the new regime
Tidy ideology: selected by the few
For the reconstructed many, any system of beliefs will do

Communists are no longer dangerous
Who could have predicted this stupefying twist?
We have Hollywood producers
Rap metal bands
Politicians
Belgians
Escaped zoo animals

Religious fundamentalists and other stalwart foes
Of the principles of reason, season-ticket holders to the show
Of power, men who cower behind propaganda tools
And absurd interpretations of a set of very simple rules

14. The Skyline - Brian Rose
Brian Rose is an architectural photographer who has photographed many aspects of New York City, including the Word Trade Center. He sings about the damaged skyline here, how it will never be the same, how this has changed him personally.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

The city my arrow, my compass and grid
The map of my palm and the secrets I hid
We were believers, the brightest and best
Uptown Downtown East Side and West

Now the streets are crooked and I've lost my way
In the glitter of rain in the lights of Broadway
In this aimless daze I am worthless and lame
As I sift through the ashes the pictures and names

I look away, I see, avoid
Shards of glass and falling stars
The skyline in your face
The skyline and its scar

Here is New York where all is desire
Zeppelins moored to the highest spires
The city, my city, of love and of power
Of high wire acts between the Twin Towers

Turn back the soldiers turn back the hands
Take me back to the place where nothing now stands
Take me back to the moment take me back to before
Let me revel again where skyscrapers soared

chorus

Give me the songs give me all the clichés
They're all that I've got to get through the day
Here is New York in black and in blue
From the Staten Island Ferry where I first kissed you

chorus

15. Been Around - “Just Jill,” aka Jill Gewirtz
Jill Gewirtz is a psychologist who was working in an office building 2 days after the attacks. On that day alone there 100 bomb scares in Manhattan, and the city was in chaos. Here she describes what it felt like to be evacuated from her building.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

Been around
I run to the bathroom window
been around..I see crowds below
been around..I go to the ground floor
been around ...the guard says evacuation
Been around but I've never seen anything like this before

(chord progression)

been around...I inform the crowd
been around..heads lift in disbelief
been around..I move through the crowd
been around...I inhale the cigarette
Been around but I've never seen anything like this before

(chord progression)
how can I contain these feelings of grief
how can I contain these feelings of anxiety
I can I believe what they say is the truth
I can I believe when it's safe to go home
(chord progression)

16. Spoonfed - Andy Germak
Here Andy Germak takes the unexpected point of view of the Afghanistan people after Bush began dropping food packages on that nation, even as we were at war with them.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

infant lines are forming
hands up to the sky
today it's raining bread and water
please don't cry

infant mouths are gaping
drooling with delight
tomorrow will bring cake and candy
please don't fight

i didn't ask to be dependent
i didn't ask to be a hungry baby
i didn't ask to be spoonfed

infant eyes are yearning
they have never seen
darkness turning
into sunlight so serene

i didn't ask to be dependent
i didn't ask to be a hungry baby
i didn't ask to be spoonfed

now they are maturing
faster than they think
soon they'll be full grown
enough to gather and conceive
constantly evolving
taking what they need
anything they need.

i didn't ask to be dependent
i didn't ask to be a hungry baby
i didn't ask to be spoonfed

i didn't ask to be dependent
i didn't ask to be a hungry baby
i didn't ask to be spoonfed

17. Life Goes On - Wendy Beckerman
Everyone says that life has changed as we know it. But what if it hasn’t?

[ mp3 sound clip ]

Eating a crumb that fell on my shirt
Coming back home from looking for work
Flag obstructing half my view
Flapping on the windshield, aching for you

Spacious sky has clouds like smoke
Wish I could laugh at their tasteless joke
Someone s dead and someone s born
Someone s popping a bucket of corn

Life goes on
Life goes on

Bless her heart she can t understand
Why her mama s crying again
Fight your fire take your risk
Not like this, baby, not like this

Life goes on
Life goes on

Heart unfurled against my hand
Sweet land of liberty stand
Television network show
Telling me less than I should know

Life goes on
Life goes on

18. Today - Noam Weinstein
A song about the magnitude of the moment.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

the sun was too bright and the clouds were too big
and the rest is too hard to recall
and everyone's asking if i am alright
i wish i could speak for us all

today something must be done
today has just begun

time used to fly over cities so tall
and shiny and strong as a pearl
what a dangerous lie when they started to fall
now they lie at the foot of the world

today something must be done
today has just begun
today has just begun

we met on the street in another surprise
and chance can destroy stronger men
but the sun was too bright for the rain in my eyes
relieved just to see you again

19. Never Forget - Amy Marie Keller
Some people left New York after the attacks. Amy Marie Keller’s song says simply; “Nothing could keep me away.I am fire and wind and I live here.”

[ mp3 sound clip ]

There's always fear at the harvest time
When the autumn breeze kicks in our hair
Something deep down keeps us walking though
At the edge of the Hudson, in the Jersey hills
(High in the air)

It's far more than fate that we're shivering
Looking hopeful to twilight and shadow dreams
Leaning back safe into memories
Where structure is still as it seems,
As it still ever seems

(chorus)
Nothing could keep me away
I am fire and wind and I live here
There is no better place than today
To sit in a circle and wait
For the winter so near

Patterns reach in and command us
Bring us to terms with the frost
The evening moon still understands us
Cradles our shoulders and whispers that
We have not lost

(chorus twice)

20. When Mohammed Came to the Mountain - Frank Tedesso
An apocalyptic vision of the violence and obscenity of the act, and the devastation left in its wake.

[ mp3 sound clip ]

could it really have been beyond reason,
calculated without regret.
this shattering of all proportions convinced us of what.

was the yawning, lazy blue of the sky complicit.
were birds caught off guard.
where were the birds
when sudden renegade moments,
with an appetite for lives,
cut loose from time
and tore the hour open
with a precision beyond comprehension.

the solid structure of the morning swayed,
and then became a waterfall of artifacts
cascading down through the air.
lunchtime apples,
neckties, bought haphazardly but given with great affection on
father's day and christmas eve;
watches & clocks emptying themselves of lost time as fast as
they could;
a spider who toiled his life away unnoticed,inside the
leaves of a camellia plant on the window sill;
many final words
& the last rags of breath;
dozens & dozens of broken eggs from the cafeteria,
ideas extinguished in mid thought,
birthday cakes,
tomorrows still & sleeping , small as caterpillars on the
under leaves of time.
a scrap of dark blue,chinese silk
from a stylishly sexy blouse;
[who shall kiss that torn breast now.]
skirts pulled up & up & up.

even the air seemed to be falling.
strangers dropping down through the darkness,
suddenly flung together and married.
nothing in between themselves.
weddings performed in all directions.
you cannot separate yourself from such moments.
an incredible descending,
unbuttoned and plummeting.
skulls slammed open & shut,
open and shut.

did starfish emerge
from the ruptured socket of the sea
and swim up river
to bear witness
to the remains of names,
naked & divided from bodies now,
piling up on the air.

the morning decomposed quickly,
devoured by some terrible awakening
and by its own uselessness.

all this hysterical information
swept over
indecent,
gawking ,
wounded logic.
details hidden in the bellies of snakes
burst forth
with inhuman surprise.
the uninhibited imagination of Death's pigs
suckled at the living
with wretched awkward skill.
in the forsaken belly of the world
had some other,more horrible virgin birth occurred;
or did the snake just fuck eve again
because the gods of men were hungry for vengeance & another little
snack.

fragments of meaning falter
in the anarchy of such dreams.
the wine where oysters once suckled
and grew fat
beneath the stairways of harbor seals,
still laps at the tip of manhattan.
yet so many things are lost amidst the tangled, threadbare
latitudes of history.

in dense silence,
washed over by oblivion,
the soul wears a thousand years lightly
as she undresses her dead,
and places them in arms
where centuries have no idea
of the obscene nothingness
hanging now over the ruins.

you keep watching the sky,
but you stop looking so furiously at the emptiness.
the infinite,indifferent blue has filled it
and yet has not filled it,
because the emptiness ignores it.

the truth is unmiraculous here.
it killed a summer dress.

you live with this strangeness.

in a furnace of melting metals,
innocent as a tea pot,
worlds evaporated.

2 corners bound by water,
one by light & mortal odor,
and one by the mournful auger
falling over the city now
of what all this becomes next.

only winter,
arranging the snow,
and the exhausted and separate moon,
ask nothing from your heart.....