Interview with Jacqueline Jules – Author of Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember

Laura: Jacqueline, I’m honored to welcome you back to Writers’ Rumpus to discuss this deeply touching book. After reading it, I can truly say you’ve achieved your goal of “honoring the lives lost and the resiliency of a city that rebuilt within a year.” What was your inspiration for creating this heartfelt collection of poems?

Jacqueline: As I mention in the introduction, I first felt a need for a book focusing on the Northern Virginia perspective of 9/11 after a conversation with a small group of students in 2008. They were completely unaware that a plane had crashed into the Pentagon seven years earlier in 2001. I can still hear their surprised voices in my head. “What happened at the Pentagon?” On September 11, 2008, the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial was dedicated. The event was televised. But children who were preschoolers in 2001 had no idea why a memorial was even necessary in Arlington. It disturbed me. I wondered if the Northern Virginia part of the September 11^th story was being overlooked.   

Years passed but my concern that the Pentagon attack was in danger of becoming a forgotten footnote to the larger New York story continued. While I can’t refute the greater loss of life in New York, the significance of attacking the seat of the United States military can’t be discounted. In the first poem of the book, titled “EMILY, Age 13,” the narrator says: “If the Pentagon isn’t safe,  no place is.”

Laura: I love how this book contains perspectives and experiences from children/young adults ranging from 5 -21 years old. Please share how you made each poem seem so unique and authentic.

Jacqueline: Thank you for your kind words about the voices in the narrative poems. I lived in Arlington from 1995 to 2021. So I was a resident there in 2001 and for twenty years after. As can be expected, the people of Northern Virginia shared their experiences from the day of the Pentagon attack over and over again. For months, every conversation included some mention of how it felt to be in Northern Virginia on that tragic day.

In one poem, “Leo, Age 15,” expresses gratitude that his mother was not in her office at the Pentagon the morning the plane crashed. He wonders “why the people who died/didn’t have somewhere else to go that day,/ why they just happened to be where they were/at that moment instead of someplace else/ with someone who must be missing them still.” Leo’s story was drawn from my son’s friend, whose mother was supposed to be in her office that morning but fortunately was not.

Another poem, “Luke, Age 16,” describes leaving school that day to hang out in the basement with his buddies. That was the story of my own teenager that day. I came home to find a group of teenage boys glued to ESPN, watching all the cancellations, and realizing, “The whole world has stopped.”

I went to the grocery in Arlington the day of the Pentagon attack and experienced as “Josselyn, Age 14,” a crowded but eerily silent store, filled with “people buying too much stuff because something else might happen.”

And like “Calista, Age 16,” whose poem shares a discussion with a preschooler about the Pentagon attack, I had a similar experience when a little boy at my school cupped his hands over my ear to whisper, “The Pentagon is broken. I saw the hole from my Daddy’s car.”

The stories recalled in Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember come from my own experiences and those of family, friends, and students. The emotions of that day and its aftermath are still vivid in my mind, over twenty years later.

Laura: You did an incredible job imbuing these poems with wide range of emotions and experiences. What was your path to publication and what is the release date? Is there any significance to that date?

Jacqueline: I decided to write about the experience of being in Arlington during the 9/11 attacks in the summer of 2019, after a discussion with an author friend who encouraged me to try. The book came together slowly. I tried several different approaches and finally chose narrative poems with individual stories. Initial reactions from my agent and editors were mixed. I tried again. And again. I got feedback from Arlington friends who shared their own stories of that day in Northern Virginia. As I described in a guest post at Writers’ Rumpus, “Following the Tracks of a Story Idea,” I am the kind of writer who puts down a manuscript and picks it up, time after time.

 In 2021, after multiple revisions, I began submitting the manuscript again. I was thrilled when David and Stephanie Miles accepted it for the Bushel & Peck list and expressed the desire to have the book released well in advance of the 25^th anniversary of 9/11. I am grateful that the book is coming out this year, so there is time for the book to find an audience before this milestone anniversary arrives in 2026.

Laura: Jacqueline, your book deserves to be read far and wide! The illustrations are absolutely stunning and fit the book’s mood so well. Did you have any input to choosing the illustrator, Eszter Anna Racz, or in the illustration process itself?

Jacqueline: My publisher, Bushel & Peck, chose the illustrator and directed the design of the book. I agree that the color palette fits the book beautifully. The firefighter on the book cover is so expressive. It sets the exact mood the reader needs before beginning to read.

Laura: Is there anything else you’d like to share?

Jacqueline: There is a Teacher’s Guide for Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember on my website and the publisher’s website.

Laura: I know the Teacher’s Guide will be benefit classroom teachers, homeschooling parents, and students alike. I’m so grateful you contacted Writers’ Rumpus and can honestly give Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember my strongest recommendation. It tugs on the heartstrings but will leave readers with a deeper understanding of the impact of the attack on the Pentagon and a feeling of hope. I completely agree with your decision that “recognizing the wounds of the past can help us understand the present.” Thank you for bringing this enlightening book to the world!

Jacqueline: Thank you, Laura! I am so grateful for the opportunity to share Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember at Writers’ Rumpus.