You had to be there....

I guess you'd have to be here...
When the fire fell from the sky that night
leaving new silent craters in my city
I'm talking to you, as I kick the rubble that was my neighbors living room
they died months ago
You probably won't understand, reading this in the comfort of your western world
I guess you had to be there... 

But I remember where I was that fateful evening
Sharing a dinner with my family in our home
My sister had leaned forward and knocked her cup of milk onto the cat
it hissed and scattered from the room in a clumsy flurry
It was the funniest thing we'd seen in a week
I guess you had to be there...

Not much is funny in a war zone, people don't even smile here
And for a moment we had all escaped our daily nightmare
My mothers soft face leaned in towards my fathers booming laughter
Love was alive in their eyes
I guess you had to be there...

No alarms, no warnings, no chance for them
No well dressed figure on a news screen shuffling papers could have prepared us for this moment
A high pitched whistle broke our breathless laughter
And in the next 5 seconds 4 things happened:
my parents threw their bodies over my sister and I
the wall to our right exploded
my neighbors died
my life changed forever
I guess you had to be there...

All I could hear was a ringing-pounding sound in my ears
my own heart beat was deafening to me
I was still coughing and dizzy when my father lifted me from the floor by my shirt collar
My mother clutching my crying baby sister in one arm was reaching for me with the other
It had happened a thousand times before but never on our street, perhaps had been lucky before
But this night the fire had crashed from the sky to my neighbors doormat
I guess you had to be there...

We were running now
My father's iron grip on my wrist was painful as we tripped over boulders and debre
A frenzy of ash and bloodied faces in the streets
everyone was running now
running away, they didn't know where
running away to nowhere
all they wanted was to stay alive
I guess you had to be there...

Another roaring whistle above our heads
The sonic demon was careening a path in the sky for exactly our direction
It couldn't have happened in slow motion but that's how i remember it
the screaming was drowned out by the whistle
We tried to turn around but we weren't fast enough
the intersection in front of us disappeared in a cloud of heat and ash
a force moved through the city as if a giant had awoken
the earth shook and my face met the concrete
I guess you had to be there...

Car alarms, more people screaming, I'm coughing, my head is wet
the world was catching speed again
Rubbing the ashes from my eyes with hands that were hot and covered in my own blood
Father, where is father?
There he is, 20 feet away stretched across the hood of a Honda truck
I raced to wake him, shaking his body
It's no use, his skull went through the windshield
more blood on my hands
A grieving horror struck me more than any bomb that could ever be dropped
I guess you had to be there...

A wailing child broke my trance
My sister!
I see her arms stretching towards me from across the street
face hot with tears and dust
A pair of lifeless shoes are sticking out from a boulder next to her
NO! Mama! NO!
Another whistle was coming but further off
I plummet to my sisters side
her tiny fists pull at my t shirt as I failed to move the enormous rock
I guess you had to be there...

We were alone now, my sister and I
I cradled her behind a dumpster until it was over
And when morning came I was still awake
But I'd never be alive again
Numbness scarred my nerves that night
The silence of death amongst the thunderous dark has taken my soul 
One cannot replace a mothers smile or a fathers laughter
I guess you had to be there...

Tags: sad, deep, scary, pain, dark,