(It is recommended to read/view the adjoining post/video, ‘Inspiration from September 11: Tragedy and Triumph,’ Before this one.)

I composed the post below, ‘An Essential Sorrow on September 11’ for 2023, as part of my ongoing effort to process the crushing enormity of September 11, 2001. That atrocity still scars our world, and I re-post it for this anniversary, while realizing any words must be inadequate to such overwhelming sorrow.

But my need to defy despair bids me try; and Mozart’s accompanying music may come closer to expressing the unimaginable.

The New York Times recently had an article about murals painted around the city soon after the catastrophe, to bear witness to it. Those catharses of grief and invocations of hope used varied imagery, but carried a common, still vital, message: Never Forget.

The piece described how many of them have deteriorated, been painted over, merged into their background, etc. Thus, they are metaphors for how that grisly date must eventually slip from living memory, as the Holocaust is doing, as its last survivors die.

Those who were alive at the time of such tragedies may, understandably, not want to re-live them forever. But the sentiments those fading murals strove to express must indeed never be forgotten. The import of such hideous crimes must be passed along to those too young at the time, or born later. They didn’t experience these traumas, yet must live in a world shaped by them.

Everyone, now or in posterity, should stay peripherally mindful of that beautiful, terrible Summer day’s lessons. One such is that no good ever has, or can, come of dragging others through Hell, trying to impose Heaven on Earth.

The World is never improved by the impulse to purify it by destroying those who do not share any fanaticism that exhorts us to sacrifice the blood and lives of others along with (or instead of) our own.

Fanaticism – murderous Self-importance – such as deluded the 9-11 terrorists to believe they might be doing the work of the Divine, rather than of the Devil. I am a ‘person of faith’ myself, but (seeking only to bear ‘Good News’) feel no need whatsoever to coerce; let alone, to kill.

But another priceless lesson of that day is, perhaps, the only good that appeared during it: Whereas the evil then was carefully planned, the heroism of Emergency Personnel, civilians, the passengers of United 93, etc. was entirely spontaneous. Many people suddenly thrust into desperate situations, rose – sometimes, magnificently – to the occasion.

Never forget that such too, can be part of the story of our species. If we take nothing else from that daylight nightmare, let us note that while it displayed humanity at its worst, it also, sporadically, summoned our best. And if we cannot be heroic, let us at least resolve not to become desensitized to the mostly lesser evils around us.

Perhaps, listen to Mozart’s ‘Lacrimosa’ – especially its end – in the re-post, while reflecting on these very different, but equally valid, ‘lessons.’

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An Essential Sorrow on September 11

This music, the ‘Lacrimosa’ (Tearful) movement from Mozart’s Requiem, is posted in honor of all the victims – heroic, helpless, or taken completely unaware – who died in the terrorism of September 11, 2001. Their lives were ferociously cut short, so all memory of their existence should not just be allowed to vaporize as well. Besides, by not forgetting about their loss, we may give a sliver of solace to their still-grieving families.

In this piece, Mozart sustains a mournful musical experience until the final measures, which resolve to a Major key, suggesting hope. Hope with no basis, in this case perhaps, other than that the spirit craves soothing from the impact of the savage impulses with which the wicked may afflict others.

But they thus darken the World for themselves too, as for all the rest of us. So we do well to guard our hearts (and minds) against such impulses – especially if we feel some duty to strive for a World better than that from which some 3000 souls were suddenly, wantonly torn that day.