(This poem was written in response to the murders of Carter Davis and Natalie Henderson in 2016. 

The students lived in my local area. I hope they find peace in heaven.)

 

 

Whilst she babbled in the kitchen chair,

millions of people paid with their lives instead of airfare. 

 

Whilst she played in peaches and plums,

the world watched in terror at the great horror the two buildings had become. 

 

Death traps fell from the sky like angels 

Their prophecy of death on iron string cables

She sat counting at the coffee table

 

A war started before her first word

The poison of violence forever uncured 

 

She was born into relative peace in '99

Never knowing of certain tragedy in 2 years time

 

Yet, she will never know the world when it was safe

All she knows is the violent images that blow up in her face

 

Airport security? Metal detectors? She knows the drill. 

A part of life that's linear. It has always existed and always will. 

 

She grows up and Osama is shot

End of the violence, for once, she thought

Wrong, terror is rising.

Fear is like a tide and she cannot keep deciding

To sleep on past the days in which children die.

Guns firing and mom just wanted to say goodbye. 

 

ISIS is killing, but so are we now too. 

Hatred has tainted our step and killed our steeds. 

Nobility means nothing when there's death in the streets. 

She's approaching adulthood and has only known fear

Seeping and sawing at the security in the atmosphere 

 

Black boys and cops lay dying

No one can find anything satisfying 

To answer the call

That asks "when will enough death be all?"

Let me ask you about the caliber of your gun

Can it really save the life of the young? 

Tear drops like bullets shot into my heart

What lesson, oh older generation, do you impart

To me? A girl born in peace but only knows violence

I hide and cower and pray for the silence. 

 

Two students, two lives, two people

Two lost lights, a knight and a hornet 

Blood from their heads in a shopping corner

Oh, how I dare to misrepresent her

Natalie, a spinner like me

17 is too early to go with nothing but dreams

Carter, a sports star and a boy of life

Turns out that Publix is deadly at night. 

 

Two kids born in peace who only knew violence

Had their heads opened on pavement without riotous

 

God, will we never be free? 

I know that she could have been me

I am 17 and I grew up in Roswell

I'm on color guard and I need some goddamn gospel

 

I was born into peace and thrust into tragedy. 

I feel loss in the world so absently. 

 

I find myself so entirely unprepared

If we manage peace, will we face it un-scared? 

 

Our generation is officially on probation

Decide, act, change the system. 

Most deal with the pressure through medication. 

 

The world is about to meet a group of adults to never know silence

Please, do not oversimplify it. 

 

We are gender breakers, religion haters, and government shakers. 

We are victims of visual violence and auditory assault.   

We are broken and lost kids. 

Afraid of the sky, the ground, and anywhere police tape forbids. 

We are but 

Broken 

And lost 

Kids.