February 28, 2001

True story.

It started out like any normal morning

Got up, ate breakfast, took off for school

First and second period classes went fine

Everything was cool.

 

I ran into my Earth Science class

Grabbed the pass to use the restroom

The restrooms were all inside the main building

Did my thing, headed back to my classroom.

 

The minute I stepped in, felt a grinding jolt

Like a truck driving with bad hydraulics on gravel

And soon after I started feeling funny

The ground beneath me began to travel.

 

Everything went in some twisted slow motion

Something just struck my head

The teacher yelled, “GET YOUR A*S UNDER THE TABLE!”

Only then I was struck with dread.

 

As the ground beneath me was already moving

Like a magic carpet ride from hell

While I was trying to get to my table

At one point I nearly fell.

 

Everything was deathly silent

As the surface waves were moving through

It seemed like with each and every second

The more violent the waves grew.

 

The first couple of seconds seemed rather cool

“It’s okay this is no big deal…Right?

It’s just an earthquake, after all,

This is life on the West side.”

 

“Okay God, it’s been like 30 minutes!”

Or so it seemed

“This is getting serious God, make it stop!”

Inside I scream.

 

Things were falling off the lab counters all around me

As all I could do from under a table is look around

As the ground beneath me was rolling violently

There was this strange sound.

 

People may think that in earthquake is silent

I tell you, that right there is not true

There’s a whole factory of earth

That’s moving underneath you.

 

The sound was like 100 B-24’s taking to the skies

But it’s something that causes you to fret

For the sound that comes from an earthquake

Is the sound you’ll never ever forget.

 

Eventually the shaking came to an end

And everything went still

Still hiding under my table

This seriously was no drill.

 

Couldn’t get out until it was safe to do so

Any minute now they’ll have us evacuate

The building surely did suffer damage

Authorities are already here to investigate.

 

How ironic it seemed that we were studying seismology

Knowing fully well that and aftershock could strike

We were given the go to get back in our seats

As the teacher said, “THAT! is what an earthquake feels like.”

Author's Note

I've been wanting to write about my experience of the Nisqually earthquake of 2001, in a poetic form for a while. I guess this is my first ever disaster poem. I still remember that day like it happened yesterday.

To me it felt like it was shaking for 30 minutes. That's because my perception of time slowed down. In any life threatening situation our perception of time slows down because it's a defense mechanism. This is why my recollection of this event seemed like it was going on for a long time, and also in slow motion. In reality the quake lasted close to 1 minute. I also heard it lasted 5 whole minutes as well.

So I'm not sure which time is right to be honest. The quake registered at 6.8 on the Richter Scale and was about 30 miles deep. For that kind of depth, it did about 2 million dollars in damage.