Ode to the Budding Flowers of Sandy Hook Elementary School

Ghelawdewos Araia

December 22, 2012

Oh what a day is Friday, December fourteen two thousand twelve

A day of carnage at Sandy Hook Elementary

In Newtown, Connecticut territory

A day that broke my heart made mothers cry

Made fathers cry

Made the whole America cry

A monster that killed his mother

May not have spared his father

Was out on that accursed day

 Two days before Sunday

Headed to Sandy hook Elementary

Armed with pistols and a gun like in the military

The evil-incarnate broke in into Sandy Hook School

Began shooting and killing the budding flowers

In their classroom pool

The twenty children that were massacred

Were only 6 and 7 years of age

Male and female that have just began life

And don’t even understand what adulthood means

Let alone old-age

The monster pruned the budding flowers

Who could have been the promise of their fathers

Pride of their mothers

My heart is broke & I don’t know what to say and what to do

But I like to call your names without further ado

So that the universe embraces you

The angles welcome you

And while humanity bid you farewell for eternity

I hereby register your names for posterity

Charlotte Bacon, Daniel Barden, Olivia Engel, Josephine Gay

Ann M. Marquez-Greene, Dylan Hockley, Madeline F. Hsu, Catherine V. Hubbard

Chase Kowalski, Jesse Lewis, James Mattioli, Grace McDonnell

Emile Parker, Jack Pinto, Noah Pozner, Caroline Previdi

Avielle Richman, Benjamin Wheeler, Allison N. Wyatt

Dr. Ghelawdewos Araia is Professor of African Studies at Lehman College of the City University of New York and Professor of International Studies at Central Connecticut State University and can be contacted via dr.garaia@africanidea.org