a congregation

there was a strange quiet that had surfaced after a moment or two. the slow creeping pitter patter of footsteps emerged from behind locked doors, as fingers wrapped around chipped wooden frames. eyes met each other from across the street as they made their stares down the stairs and over the gutters. they made contact shortly after they had memorized the littered street... or rather, what was left of it. debris had fallen atop the vehicles that lined the asphalt one way and then the other. the metal was so commonplace on any other day. any other day but today... today it seemed so distracting and out of place. so strange to see metal beneath brick and drywall and all of that pink and yellow ventilation. all the people cautiously stole footing toward the cluttered street and the murmuring began. "what was it?", they asked. "was it another terrorist attack?", floated around from head to head. everyone pondered these questions as their attention was taken upward in anticipation to the sky. that beautiful sky... it was dyed a deep deep purple with astronomical streaks of sanguine. they blew up the big picture and were found for what seemed like every inch of the sky. the gaze toward the heavens was given by every onlooker that crowded the already crowded street. it was possibly some sad attempt to stop what was obviously inevitable. a faint whistle groped its way through the atmosphere and felt its way around to the people's ears like a blind man feeling his way down an empty corridor. there was only one way to head, it was truly inescapable. 

the high pitched falling floated around their heads and slowly pounded ear drums as if being beaten slowly... lovingly... rhythmically... as ghastly as a funeral procession. 

serenity draped over the eyes of the worried human beings like a warm blanket and extinguished their fears as they realized what they saw. and that was all that they needed.