By JIM BARON

PROVIDENCE — The bleak anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks was marked at the State House Thursday with speeches, prayers, poems and musical performances.

Standing beside a golden replica of the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center Carcieri said those who died that day “live in our hearts and in our memories.”
Recalling Pearl Harbor, which he said happened when he was a youngster, and the Kennedy assassination, during his college years, Carcieri noted, “there are certain dates that get fixed and I’m sure all of us remember crystal clear where we were seven years ago on September 11.”
With a nod to the National Guardsmen and military personnel standing at ease in the back of the Bell Room, Carcieri said, “to see the work being done by our military is nothing short of amazing – great heroism day in and day out. We all pray for the safe return of Rhode Islanders currently deployed and all our men and women in the services. They are doing this on our behalf.”
Rachel Warren of Trinity Rep sang an a cappella version of “I Will Remember You” and closed the program with a rendition of “God Bless America.” Fred Scheff opened the ceremony with the national anthem and sang “You Raised Me Up,” also without musical accompaniment.
John Knasas, a North Smithfield High School teacher who is also a member of the musical group Brass Attack played a solo version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” on saxophone. Classical guitarist Dennis Costa performed a piece by J.S. Bach. First Lady Sue Carcieri read the poem “Winter Eve.”
It was a somber observance; there was no applause after any of the performances. At the end, Carcieri called for a round of applause for all of the performers.
“If there was ever a time we needed to recapture the sense of unity and purpose we had as a nation coming together the way we did on September 11, we need to get together and realize we are one nation, one people striving to do well in the world,” Carcieri said.
See 9/11, Page A-2
After the ceremony, the governor recalled a visit to the White House a few years ago. He said President Bush gave the visitors a tour of the Oval Office and told them “who ever is the next president and they sit in this chair, and they read the daily briefing reports and the threats against us and the harm that people want to do to us as a nation, it brings back that’s what that was about, it is still there, it is a fact of life we have to live with.”
Carcieri says the other thing that strikes him is “how the world has changed since September 11 – every time we go to an airport anywhere. It has monumentally affected how we move about as a society and the things we do.”
The governor ordered all Rhode Island flags to be flown at half-staff for the day, as President Bush did for U.S. flags in observance of what is sometimes called Patriot Day.