seconds after it happens you will feel nothing; a numbness that somehow hurts more than anything. it will start in your chest, as a grey mist clenches your groaning heart and surrounds your lungs; like a life jacket it will keep you from drowning, while forcing your head underwater until you can no longer bear it. letting you up to breathe for a split second, then pushing you back under. torture. your thoughts will stop dead. your mind will tell you that the world is wrong, your heart will insist that you are not broken…
they are both lying.


years after it happens you will remember the pain, the scars will still paint your skin, but they will no longer sear through you, raised and angry; instead they will be relics of an old memory. in life, you will hurt, but you will carry on. and that, my dear,
is how you will survive

Everyday there’s a new story
A new plea that goes ignored
An outcry for protection
That the government “can’t afford”

A community is broken
A family in bits
A mother holds her dead son
It didn’t need to be like this

“My thoughts and prayers are with you”
What’s that gonna do?
It’s easy enough to stand back
When it isn’t affecting you

People post on social media
About the horrors of the crime
But how can they truly comment
When their school isn’t next in line?

A march to show the ‘big men’
What their little minds can’t see
Real humans suffering
At the word “death” they turn and flee

A 15-year-old boy bleeds
His life already done
He wants someone to hold him
His last word escapes, “Mom”

This is real, this is wrong
This is happening now
Children scared of education
In case they get shot down

So, now forget the hashtags
Now forget the thoughts
Now we need action
Not more ****** news reports.