In one poem, ''A Patch of Blue,'' Mr. Fernandez described the color of the sky that day over Wall Street and a tattered bit of blue cloth, perhaps from a police uniform, he saw on the street after the buildings collapsed. The worst, he said, was watching helplessly as people jumped. His poem, ''The Birds,'' is about those who leapt to their deaths. ''Some people fell like sacks, some spread their arms, and one couple held hands and jumped together,'' he said. ''It was courageous. At that last moment people, still had the presence of mind to choose how they would end their lives. I thought that deserved to be noted.''
Chris Hedges, NY Times