Imbalance of Terror

Thousands who sweated and strained so long to train young bodies for excellence are overwhelmed in the national mind (who actually won the Marathon?) by the evil of one soul (certainly no more than a handful) exploding pressure cookers stuffed with nails and ball bearings.

The lopsided imbalance of life and death in Boston can never be redressed, despite the President’s emphasis on the courage of victims and responders as the search for the guilty goes on.

There can be no balancing of the books with retribution for such mindless murders and maiming, no matter what the identity or motives of whoever caused it.

The low-tech trappings suggest “amateur” terrorists rather than organized, but there is little consolation in considering how much worse the toll might have been at the hands of such as those who perpetrated 9/11.

In an interconnected world, there is at least faint hope of detecting in advance the movements of many. From one dark mind with knapsacks, there is nothing.

Those who ran the marathon will return to their homes all over the world, their usual joy in accomplishment forever shadowed. The rest of us will forget the race and await an explanation for the inexplicable.    

Update: As the search zeroes in on figures with knapsacks, the identity of the Marathon killers comes closer to the surface, but the heart of their darkness will remain elusive.