Author Wishes

Author's Wishes

The coverage won’t end,
Soldiers killed inside

The largest base at home,
At home, I’m drawn to reporters

Asking for updates,
Hoping they’d announce

You were white so we may talk
About mental health or gun control,

If then, maybe your motives,
However, terrifying are discussed

As part of the American culture.
Then your name was released,

So they cast you away
From the gates of America,

And wondered collectively
What God you prayed to.

Now there is a chorus
About your Muslim faith,

Generous as rice at a wedding—

A celebration: for faith
To be discussed instead

Of why an American soldier
Born and raised in Virginia

Opened fire on his kin,
On our shores.

Now tomorrow, salt
Will still sting the wound,

And I’ll wish that grief
Won’t take a man,

Made from my rib,
And have him

Answer to which
God he prays to

Under the cautious
Eyes of red-blooded Americans

Who would want nothing
More than for their grief to congeal

Into fists
Against his jaw,

In front of his home
And family, in America.

But if it does happen,
Lord, if it does happen,

Then please let us
Mourn and be outraged,

As we lay witness
To this violence

Between brothers
On television.

Brats