of these tragedies
in the past few years.
Each time I react not as
a president,
but as anybody else
would—
And that was especially
true today.
I know there's not a
parent in America
who doesn't feel the
same overwhelming grief.
The majority of those
who died
were children—
beautiful, little kids.
They had their entire
lives ahead of them —
weddings, kids of their
own.
Among the fallen were teachers,
men and women who
devoted their lives
to helping our children
fulfill their dreams."
So our hearts are broken
today
for the parents and
grandparents,
for the sisters and
brothers
for the families of
those who were lost."
Our hearts are broken today
for the
parents of the survivors,
blessed
as they are
to have
their children home tonight.
They know
that their children's innocence
has been
torn away from them too early
and there
are no words
that will
ease their pain."
As a country,
we have been through
this too many times.
an elementary school in
Newtown,
a shopping mall in
Oregon,
a temple in Wisconsin,
a movie theater in Aurora,
r a street corner in
Chicago.
These neighborhoods
are our neighborhoods;
these children are our
children.
We’ll hug our children a
little tighter,
we'll tell them that we
love them,
we'll remind each other
how deeply
we love one another.
May God bless
the memory of the
victims
and heal the
brokenhearted
and bind up their
wounds.
I took the text of Obama’s speech to the nation about the massacre
in Connecticut and condensed it a little and inserted line breaks to achieve this
poem. It was a very poetic and beautiful speech.
My thoughts kept returning to two things. In the Orlando Sentinel yesterday, printed before
the shooting happened, the paper printed a tweet from Andy Borowitz: “Maybe I’m
a dreamer, but I wish mental health care was as easy to get as say, a gun.”
The other thought was about the Christmas presents the families of
these slain children probably had hidden in their closets, all wrapped and
ready for Christmas morning, the parents imagining the joy on their children’s
faces when they opened these presents, these presents that these children will now
never receive.
© 2012 Catherine Giordano
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The picture of President Obama speaking to the nation
about the Connecticut shooting is from
http://bigstory.ap.org |
