Tears wash down a face.
A heart drowned infinitely.
The barrel in place.

Tell me
That gun that you're so proud of
Why does it tremble so much?
Is your hand following your unstable mind?
Is that the same hand that holds your child's?

Your emotions
Fragile enough to be crushed with a hug
Insecure enough to attack a compliment
Corrupt enough to endlessly reload on lies and deceit
Are those the same emotions you shoot into your wife at night?

Your bullets roar so loudly
What voices are you trying to drown out?
Your heartbeat clanks at the speed of the fallen shells
What are you so afraid of?
A man armed and ready to go off at any moment like you?

Tell me
What can you manage to defeat?
With those trembling hands
Uncertain of what to take aim at
You shoot down anything that moves
Uncertain of where the trigger is
You pull at anything you can reach
Uncertain of how much enemies are left
You forever stay in the trenches
I now know that when you bow your head at church that it's not for prayer

Then hoping to nullify your senseless you refuse to leave the battlefield
And take no-mans-land everywhere you go

You wear your bulletproof vest and rifle to the supermarkets, schools, offices, dinner tables, churches, and funerals

Forever firing
Forever charging
Forever defending
Forever fighting
Yourself.

Point the barrel at me.
Let me see my future
unfold right before my eyes
as you pull the trigger.

When will we reach a day when we can rise above the hate?
Will we reach that day or is it already too late?
When we will just raise our arms and proclaim,
Enough?

If the right to bear arms is more important than the right to live,
why don't the children say,
Enough?

If the cage we put ourselves in is built on lies,
when do the people say,
Enough?

When in their dying breath, as the bullet reaches the end
and brings only the sweet embrace of death,
when do we let the children stop and raise the arms,
stand together and say
at last,
Enough?

When do we say no more?
When do we stop having to cry over the body of a kindergartener clutching their backpack tight?
When do we have to stop sending a child to a place to learn and tell them what to do if there is a gun or a fight?
When do we have to stop wondering whether today as a parent you say to your child your last I Love You and Goodbye.
When do we say we will not just lay down and die?

When do we say,
Enough.

You are a bullet,
harmless, fascinating, daunting -
when unprovoked and on your own.
Except maybe a choking hazard.
Nice to touch and feel on my skin, but cold.

Give you power,
or a gun,
your aim is never accurate but
deadly all the same.

I can replay it - you charging
at the TV with incredible speed -
in slow motion.
The sound that followed was deafening.
It was an ear ringing, catastrophic explosion.
It was your fist meeting the screen,
us screaming and me crying,
on my cut up and bruised knees,
begging for you not to leave.

I had a tendency to chase after bullets
and a desire to fix the mess they would create.
I didn’t realise that I was the one being chased.
And that I was my mess I had to clean up.

I’ve stopped going after bullets.
(But now I play with fire.)

She sat alone.
Alone and at home.
Where her screams were silent,
But her mind was violent.
Her insecurities hid deep inside.
And they indeed, ate her alive.
A tear rolled down her face
As her heart began to race.
She took her blade and tore her skin,
Where her depression lied deep within.
This went on for days,
Months,
Years,
And until she cried her very last tears.
She decided she had enough,
The world around her was much too tough.
She took a gun to her head.
Congratulations society,
She is dead.

Count or stop to count
7, 6, 5… then silence.
Started from the one to countless

Fatally wounded, again inequitable ethnic
the trumpet sound of trauma
In a private car, but this was
not a public performance

7 bullets transmit the pride and prejudice
Police have millions of reasons to suspect,
but we criticize the moon—
tonight it’s dark as hell in a drawer.

Count or stop to count
5,6,7… then gun violence.
His truth is lazy
and infinite as broken glass.

You are in our prayers— we pray infinitely.
We would like to have
a brave trumpet show for ourselves—
Deep sorrow, tumultuous but informative.