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Another shooting on the southeast side. |
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This a drive-by, mid-day, |
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Outside of the bus stop, by |
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Fuller and |
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Franklin. |
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Or near there. |
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Not far from the park. |
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About a block from where the other shooting was last |
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Month. Or was it last week? |
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Shots were fired from an |
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SUV heading northbound, |
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Eastown, The target a rival but they didn't hit the target this time. |
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They hit a kid we think had nothing to do with it. |
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And I travel backwards through time and space and |
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I disintegrate, become |
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Invisible. |
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I want to see it where |
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I couldn't when it happened. |
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I want to see it all first hand this time. |
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I want to know what it felt like. |
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So I float behind police lines, reconstruct the scene in fragments of |
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Memories. |
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I want to know what his mother looked like up close, |
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I want to see her |
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Leaning over his body. |
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So I float there, transcend time. |
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I want to capture it accurately. |
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I want to know what the color of the blood was spilling out from the tarp |
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Onto the concrete. |
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I want to write it all down so |
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I can always remember. |
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If you could see it up close how could you ever forget how senseless death, |
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How precious life. |
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I want to be there when the bullet hit. |
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And the crowd poured out as the shots drowned into siren sounds, out of |
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There houses now |
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And over front yards, all the way up to the place where the police tape ran |
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To mark the crime |
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Scene. Everybody trying to catch a glimpse of what was happening, |
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Of what was going on between the ambulance and all the cop cars. |
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Everybody gossiping, "Whose kid got hit? Where'd it hit him? And who Could've fired it?" |
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Everybody wondering, "How did it happen again? And is he dead? These Children. Our kids." |
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Everybody wondering how far they were from where the victims lived. |
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And I visit them, their houses. |
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Inside my dream |
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I visit them. |
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My spirit, soaring high and high up over |
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King Park, leaves the crime scene, |
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Travels further back |
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Till far before the shooting, through their windows, to their living rooms. |
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I see them younger this time, playing games and doing homework. |
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All these marks of youth soon transformed coldly into stone for fights and |
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Stupid feuds. |
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For ruins wrapped in gold. |
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And cruelly |
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I recall why |
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I have come: |
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To find a |
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Reason. But |
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There cannot be a reason, not for death, not like this. |
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Not like this. |
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Three days later they made funeral plans. |
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The family. |
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Three days later a mother had to bury her son. |
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Not far away the shooter holed up in a hotel near to the highway with a |
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Friend and the gun. |
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That same gun. |
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He'd fled immediately but was identified by witnesses, his |
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Picture on |
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TV. Only 20 years old, they called him "Grandpa." |
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He was older than the others |
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By a year, |
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Maybe two. |
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And he was safe for awhile until somebody saw him there and notified the |
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Authorities |
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Who surrounded the hotel, first arresting an accomplice while attempting to |
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Flee, Then chasing him up the staircase to the floor where he'd stayed. |
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He closed |
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The door hard |
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Behind him, locked himself in the room. |
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They could've kicked in the door but knew the gun was still with him, |
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One he'd already used and so they feared what he'd do. |
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I floated up through the window of a room to the |
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West. I hovered out to the hallway, tried to listen in. |
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I heard them trying to reason, get him to open the door. |
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His uncle begging and pleading, half-collapsed to the floor. |
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He preached of hope and forgiveness, |
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Said, "There is always a chance to rectify what you've taken, make your Peace in the world." |
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I thought to slip through the door, |
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I could've entered the room, |
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I felt the burden of murder, it shook the earth to the core. |
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Felt like the world was collapsing. |
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Then we heard him speak, "Can I still get into heaven if I kill myself? Can I still get into heaven if I kill myself? Can I ever be forgiven cuz I killed that kid? It was an accident I swear it wasn't meant for him! And if I turn it on me, if I even it out, can I still get in or will they Send me to hell? Can I still get into heaven if I kill myself?" |
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I left the hotel behind, don't want to know how it ends. |
