9/11 RIVER OF TEARS

September 11,
Worse than a
Greek tragedy!
During Greek

Tragedies,
There were
Bodies to mourn
And weep over,
For a few days,
Respectfully buried
In decent graves!

Big men
In high places,
With power
In their hands,
Cowardly,
They play games,
They do injustice
To others
To benefit themselves!

And the price is
Usually paid
By the
Innocent,
The naive
And the brave!

Charon is hidden
In a thick,
Cloudy, dark smoke,
Standing on top
Of the Twins’ ruins!
Stretching all the way
To the heavens
Like a heartless,
Titanic executioner
With a scythe
In his hands
Eliminating thousands
Of souls,
Sending them into
The heavens
And down below
Spreading his unmerciful
Horror!
Despair, dust and debris
Catastrophe all over,
River of tears!

Long distance away,
Son of a bitch Laden
With a satanic, sadistic
Smile on his face,
Celebrating that tragic day
With his conspirators,
Full of joy
And parade.
What a disgrace,
How inhuman!

Claiming themselves
A holy religion,
By taking innocent lives,
They take God’s name in vain.

Piles of dirt and dust,
Chaos, fear,
Anger and sadness
Masks on their faces,
River of tears!

Manhattan Island,
Is the soul
Of the Empire State,
Blessed with riches,
From devoted, hard work.
No one works
As much,
As hard
As New Yorkers!
They are always
Sleepless!

Without discrimination,
With an open heart,
Blindly trusting
The entire
World

Jealousy,
Envy,
With laziness a plenty,
They hate us
And blame.

They decided one day
A surprise attack
To destroy
The finest Olympian Crown
Which the whole world
Was so proud of it.

Viciously they smashed it
Down to the ground,
“Ground Zero”
Has been named!

Killing
The innocent,
The naïve,
The brave,
And the proud!

The best,
The brave,
So many heroes
Of the USA,
Severely torched,
Soaked with jet fuel,
Burned alive!

Bodies were blown to pieces,
Many were disintegrated
And vanished!

Hospitals were empty,
Some wounded,
The rest dead!
Smell of death
All over!
Panicking sad faces,
River of tears!

Children,
Sisters and mothers,
River of tears!

Husbands and wives,
Loved ones
Missing!
Grandfathers, grandsons,
Brothers and fathers,
River of tears!

Throughout every
Community
We became
One family
With painful mourning
And grieving,
River of tears!

Hopelessly searching
For bodies,
Dead or alive!
Unidentified
Mixed body parts,
Despair,
Smell of death,
Grief,
River of tears!

No bodies,
No flesh,
No open caskets.

No open graves
In the cemeteries!
No bodies to bury.
No permanent farewells.

Friends and relatives,
Furious and Confused,
Where to send flowers and
Condolences!
How to handle this tragedy?
Rivers of Tears

Shadows of death
And fear,
Shadows of silence
And anger,
Confusion, despair,
Depression
Cover the city,
River of tears!

Jewish people with
Sneakers on their feet,
Wearing plain clothes,
Instead of well dressed uniforms
Running in and out of synagogues,
Fearing another Holocaust!
Rivers of tears

Every living soul,
Including animals and dogs,
Everyone cried
For such a great loss
Rivers of tears

Now I know how
The Irish and Israeli’s feel
The agony, the pain
By facing terror everyday!
Living in chaos and fear
For more than 40 years!
Facing death from town to town
How can they function as a nation?
How can they find peace?
How can they be productive?
How can they be in control?

Whatever they have accomplished
Has been a miracle after all!
Rivers of tears!

Demolition workers,
Rescue teams,
Many volunteers,
No living souls,
No one alive,
Big disappointments
River of tears!

Red Cross workers,
Doctors and nurses,
Rivers of tears!

Policemen, firemen,
Coast guard and military,
River of tears!

Notes and pictures
On walls and everywhere,
People searching for
Their loved ones,
No response,
No good news
From anywhere,
River of tears!

Candles on sidewalks
Candles in churches
Synagogues and temples,
River of tears!

Students, teachers,
Priests,
Sisters and preachers,
Nuns and monks,
River of tears!

Days gone by,
Sleepless nights,
Waiting for the telephone
To ring,
To hear if their
Loved ones
Are dead or alive!
No good news,
So many bodies
Vanished,
River of tears!

Thousands of glowing candles
Adorned Union Square,
Accenting pictures
Edged by vibrant personal letters
Of identities,
With means of contact!
Private, unlisted numbers
Do not count any longer.
With painful mourning
And grief,
People sleeping
In the street,
Absentmindedly walking like zombies,
They have lost their existence,
They have lost the rhythm of their lives.
Life has no meaning any longer.
River of tears!

Depression spread throughout
Police stations,
Firehouses
And through all public
And private places,
River of tears!

Brothers and sisters,
Broadcasters and listeners,
Reporters and readers,
Photographers and viewers
Sad paperboys
River of tears!

Postal workers,
Delivery men,
Distress and fear,
River of tears!

COMPASSION,
STRONGER THAN EVER!

Father Judge
Ran out of tears,
Heroically,
With pleasure
Offered his life and soul,
With other volunteers,
To the miserable death!

Pataki, Giuliani and so many other leaders,
Tremendously exhausted
From the responsibilities!
River of tears!

Giuliani attending
Three to four funerals
A day!
Melancholic sounding
Bag pipes
Are heard throughout
All the cities of
The United States
Honoring
The heroes,
The innocent, the brave!
River of tears!

Woe, mourning,
Anger,
Bravery and unity
All at the same time!
Terrorists have
No place in
The United States!

Mike Bloomberg
Courageous with determination
Taking over the city in chaos
Rivers of tears!

Mike Bloomberg
With thousands of decisions
How to restore the city
How to rehabilitate the citizens
How to encourage and comfort the city
Always taking the fist step as a great leader
Rivers of tears!

Countless are the dead,
But their souls and spirits
Will remain
As a foundation
To withstand the strength
Of new towers
To rise Stronger,
With Olympic flame,
With new golden crown!
With a wreath of
Gray, green branches
From an olive tree,
To be crowned by St. Nicholas
From below!

The new towers
Will stand
As a memorial,
As a tombstone,
As a new holy ground!

This nation is strong
And strong it will remain
Because it has been built
With strong, solid bones,
European bones
Of our grandfathers,
And black African
Sacrifices!

This nation was built
Brick by brick,
With Christian
Bones, Sweat, and blood,
Oh, my heart is now
Bleeding, my eyes filled
With tears, and my body
Trembling
From this tragedy,
From the injustice!
River of tears!

This nation is
Founded and built
Lot by lot,
Block by block
With Christian spirit,
With Christian blood.

This nation
Is Christian
And Christian it will remain.
GOD bless
Christianity,
GOD bless
The U.S.A.!
GOD bless
Bill Graham.

GOD bless
Those souls
That departed
In such a
Tragic way!

Love and prosperity
Will continue to flourish
Throughout the U.S.A!
We all,
Philadelphia,
We shall remain.

Always,
We shall have unity,
Orientals, Jews,
Hispanics,
Blacks and Whites!
We all
Shall eat
From
The same
Plate!
Philadelphia,
We all shall remain.

I know sometimes
We might get angry
With one another!
But please remember
September 11
And call each other
Brother.
Always, Philadelphia
We shall remain.

In the name of GOD,
In the memory
Of the souls
That departed,
Discrimination
We shall destroy.
Philadelphia
We shall remain.
GOD bless
U.S.A.
I guess I was
One of the lucky ones
Not to have any
Family members
Missing!
And yet so many
Woes, pain and
Sadness,
And I am still
Mourning!
 
Driving home after midnight
Towards the Verrazano Bridge
On the Bay Ridge side,
A huge tractor-trailer,
Ahead of me,
Filled with steel and I-beams,
Pulled over to the side,
Right before the bridge,
To check his load!
I pulled up behind him,
And I went over to the trailer
And touched
The smoke twisted steel.
It was still hot
From the World Trade Center
Inferno,
And I felt the heat
On my palms!
 
The sadness and grief
Was deep in my heart!
I felt I touched a
Huge, enormous funeral!
I felt I touched
All the departed souls!
 
I went back to my truck,
I sat behind the wheel,
I couldn’t start my truck
For over fifteen minutes.
I had knots in my stomach,
I cried
With all my heart!
 
Despite a clear night,
With blue skies,
I felt above me
A thick cloud of
Darkness and death!
I felt so depressed,
Like everyone else.
 
Holy War they call it.
How can holy people
Declare a war?
God bless the Tibetans.
 
Religious institutions
Education, Civilization,
Technology, Prosperity,
Abundance!
 
Humane civilizations,
Philanthropic civilizations,
Sentimentalists, compassionates,
Honesty and justice
Has no existence.
 
It’s such a disgrace and a shame
That the evil,
 The uneducated,
The uncivilized,
 The worthless
Can destroy and take over
The beautiful civilization
Of the U.S.A!
 
We have the best
School system,
The best of everything,
The best democracy!
If we don’t watch out,
If we don’t correct
The criminal justice
And the court system in the U.S.A!
Then this country is doomed.
*The joke made in New York Magazine,
That will become
Our reality one day,
Very soon,
In less than 50 years!
If you don’t believe me,
You can trace back to
All the beautiful past civilizations
For they have all collapsed
From evil, from the uneducated,
From the uncivilized
From the worthless!

As the great King Solomon said,
“There is a time for war
And a time for peace”….
 
Now it’s time for war….
 
Written by: Stavros Sitaras
Copyright C 5 19 48 9 11 2001  

 
St. Nicholas was a small church next to the Twin Towers.  It was built by Greek seamen, because to Greek seamen, St. Nicholas replaced the Greek god Neptune/Poseidon as their protector.

During the construction, the walls of the church and the rest of the building were going off plumb.  To support the leaning wall and prevent its collapse, the amateur volunteer seamen builders built another wall next to it.  I saw this personally in the 1990’s because a friend of mine was doing renovations on the building and he called me down for advice. When I saw the walls I was amazed by their thickness!  The walls in some places were more than three to four feet in width!

During the time of the erection of the church, the Greek seamen opened a small luncheonette for the priest and his family to make a living because there were not too many Greeks living in New York. The busiest time for the church was when the Greek ships arrived into New York Harbor. That was the time when the biggest contributions were collected.

During the Second World War, all the Greek ship-owners and captains used to meet at that particular luncheonette. The Wall Street executives would say that if a bomb would hit that place, the entire economy would collapse and the Americans would lose the war because the Greek seamen and captains transported the largest part of the Americans’ ammunition to Europe and around the world! When the Greek seamen arrived in America, they were interviewed by the American navy. They would offer the captain, second captain and third captains or any other capable navigator to take the Liberty ships that were built in the United States, like hotcakes, and transfer ammunition to Europe or any other part of the world that needed it. They would leave the Greek incoming ship with one capable navigator and replace the rest of the crew with capable seamen.

Many amateur seamen captains were taken by the American government, making them chief captains and giving them American citizenship as long they knew how to read the stars and navigate the Liberty ships to the course of their mission.

Many offspring of those seamen reside today in the Bay Ridge neighborhood of Brooklyn, NY and tell the stories.  Most of them come from my island, Chios (the hometown of Homer), which is the same place where Columbus gathered a crew for his navigation to reach America. If he had not taken a crew from my island, he would have disappeared into the Bermuda Triangle.

I forgot to mention that the captains who led successful missions and survived the war got to keep the ships for themselves as a reward from the American government.

Until 1962, I witnessed brand new Liberty American ships covered with rust-proof grease to be protected from corrosion, which were still docked on the Mississippi River when I saw it. The Mississippi River was an enormous forest of beautiful, brand-new Liberty vessels and my crew, including myself, were astonished by the beauty and the huge amount of left-over and untouched Liberty Ships. The Americans had enough power to fight 3 Second World Wars. These were the strongest ships that were ever built; they were stronger than the Titanic.
 
My friend, Thomas Crean, told me that thousands of Liberty Ships were near the Bear Mountain in the Hudson River by the military academy. These ships were re-activated and re-modeled and were used during the Vietnam War. In 1959, after the Korean War, Thomas Crean served in the military at 17 years old for over a year. The Liberty Ships, according to older seamen who served on it, were unsinkable. They are still the most beautiful looking ships and are the strongest made ships in American history.
 
One Liberty Ship, the SS Robert E. Peary, was laid at 12:01 AM on November 8, 1942. 250,000 parts weighing about 14,000,000 pounds were assembled in 4 days, 15 hours, and 29 minutes. Liberty Ships, also known as the "Ugly Duckling" workhorses of World War II, were built in 13 states by 15 companies in 18 shipyards around the nation. They might be known as “Ugly Duckling” ships, but to me, they are beautiful. I believe someone who has knowledge and class would agree.
http://www.usmm.org/peary.html


All the European nations signed a peace treaty with Germany within one hour to four days. Greece refused to sign a peace treaty until the country was totally demolished and destroyed and there were no men left to fight. Greece’s resistance against the Germans lasted more than 200 days.  Sweden signed the treaty within 10 minutes; France signed the treaty within three days.

During World War II, Greece was the only country that was forced to confront the armies of four countries simultaneously:

Albania
Italy
Germany
Bulgaria


Duration of Resistance (in days):

Greece 219
Norway        61
                                                   France      43 (The superpower at the time)
Poland  30
Belgium  18
Holland    4
Yugoslavia    3
Czechoslovakia  0
Luxemburg    0
  Denmark       0  
(The Danes surrendered to a Nazi motorcyclist who was conveying Hitler’s request to the Danish king for the crossing of the Nazi armies.  The Danish king, indicating submission, surrendered his crown to the motorcyclist to take to Berlin and Hitler.)

​Furthermore, my family members visiting from Canada were the first tourists to go all the way to the top of the Twin Towers.  The towers were still unfinished at the time, with their structural steel beams and decks exposed.  I gave my family hardhats to wear and took them up to the top on a service elevator.

After the tragedy of the Twin Towers, it took me more than five years to recover emotionally, physically, and mentally.  About a year after the tragedy I took some of my family and friends from Canada to the wooden observation deck at Ground Zero, and all the American people were proceeding with silence and sorrow.  It was worse than attending a funeral.  Other people coming away from the deck had sad faces and tears in their eyes.

With my lousy luck, and I guess lousy timing, a young group of Muslim boys were returning from the observation deck with laughter and pleasure on their faces.  That really made me sick to my stomach and very angry. I still visualize that particular scene in my mind.

A friend of mine said Muslim people were celebrating and setting off fireworks on Forest Avenue in Staten Island on the night of September 11th.  Americans feel sorry when they see people in the Muslim countries being killed innocently. Muslim people do not feel the same way. I think our enemy is in our own back yard and we ignore them.

Throughout history, Greeks contributed so much of themselves for the freedom of mankind. All the history channels neglect to talk about the beating that the Greek nation sustained during the Second World War.

American women and Greek seamen were the backbone for the Americans, allowing them to win the Second World War!

In the Korean War, the Greek Army and the Greek Air Force were better than all the other armies that took part at that time!  The Greeks always come out winners, despite the fact that they were hit accidentally by heavy friendly fire!

Written by:
Steven Stavros Sitaras

​St. Nicholas Church
http://libertyworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/St.-Nicholas-Greek-Orthodox.gif

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This is the new design and plan to re-build St. Nicholas Church by the World Trade Center to replace the old one.
http://tribecacitizen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/St-Nicholas-rendering-courtesy-Santiago-Calatrava-420x630.png

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The best American Liberty Ships which liberated the world by supplying food, equipment and ammunition throughout Asia and Europe.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTzgB-u_VyTbDbVLYup95DCbAd6zshFt4jqaMeqwjfZ7WEzNPE1hg

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Rosie the Riveter
http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/rosie-the-riveter
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/12/We_Can_Do_It!.jpg

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