Nine One One

A friend of mine was asleep,
two blocks away,
they call them blocks,
and he woke up and screamed at the window
because it was so fucking loud,
the sirens mostly, the sirens
sounded like the apocalypse,
whatever that would sound like,
and he hadn't got to bed 'til four
and he'd been drinking Sam Adams
and he was the only person in the bar
because real New Yorkers
prefer the day-time,
the delis, the parks,
and real New Yorkers
leave the night and early morning
to foreigners and my friend
was the first person in the world to notice
that the day was nine one one
which was the number
for the American emergency services,
he knew this from TV,
and he was the first to pick up on the joke
because look ' its nine one one and here,
two blocks away, it's happening,
and if you ring nine one one
you'll only get a tone
and it's funny to think
that before all the technicalities
of training and planning,
among the preliminary meetings
that took place
there was someone with the sort of mind
that takes pleasure in small
symmetries, gets a kick out of details,
and that someone must have said,
hey fellas, guys,
I've got an idea.