Downtown Talca 2010

Today, as I was working on the trauma healing project:  Roots in the Ruins: Hope in Trauma, I remembered the Feb. 27th, 2010 Earthquake....

Downtown Talca after the Earthquake

I walked downtown today

as I have countless times before,

crossing the main square to the post office

then heading up South One, the shopping street.

Weaving in and out, avoiding

people columned like dominoes

round the corner and

up the steps into the bank.

The lady selling band aids,

out-shouts other vendors,

and beggars,

and the music escaping from shops

to gulp down the morning breath of

coffee or fried food.

The policeman with the police dog watch

just like any other day.

It brings me up short.

I twist my head, ears straining

To fill in what is missing

behind the familiar noise…

Deafening silence.

I walk a little further and

stop.

I perceive

past the cacophony of

normalcy…

Screaming silence.

My heart skips

a beat

or two.

I, the one who loves silence,

   who pursues quiet

   like the photographer who seeks

   the prized instant

   when the shutter snaps and

   freezes time,

am frightened.

While others weep before the walls fallen,

  the holey roofs imprisoned behind the

  barrier of red warning tape,

  and the buildings condemned by orange

  spray paint crossing out another burial site,

I am engulfed by the

raging silence.

Two blocks, then three; and

silence hunts me down, a mountain lion

intent on its prey. My legs stay but my pounding

heart runs away, failing  gallantly

to imagine the stolen sounds

that left behind the

vacuum.

I turn into a busy street,

welcoming as never before,

the hum idling at a stoplight,

the screech of brakes,

the roar of revving motors, that

drown out the

silence

of downtown Talca after the

earthquake.

Elena Huegel

March 24, 2010