Dear God

Dear God,

I’ve never been in an active shooting.

And for that I count my prayers.

So why do I feel scared?

Dear God,

How can a school have three fields, old as time, still feel like a novelty?

How can a school have three floors with more to spare and still feel suffocating?

How did the kids of the 90s rule the school when I get scolded for being late to lunch?

Dear God,

How can they protect us with fear in their eyes?

How can they protect us when they know it won’t work?

How can they protect us when their best shield is a door and their best weapon is cane?

Dear God,

They watch us like a hawk.

They don’t let us outside on our own.

They run drill after drill until dark corners and supply closets become comforting.

They usher students against the wall in false alarms.

They’re scared, that’s what they are.

Dear God,

Why is a place, so holy, painted with fear?

Every day a guard stands by the door.

On Friday services, they warn us of the bloody tapestries painted in Synagogues.

On Sunday school, they usher yet another batch of kids into dark corners.

Dear God,

This time it’s different.

At school I’m comforted by fit teachers and escape windows.

Here, the windows are sealed by an unfortunate design.

I am sitting next to my mom in a room of children and one other teen.

She walks with a cane,

and there’s no escape.

What is a teenager if not a child?

And if a child were tasked to save the world,

then we’d all be picking out our coffins.

Dear God,

I count my prayers as my country burns.

Our country was built from the flames of war.

It’s only fitting that our countries flame goes out from the biblical floods.

From ashes to ashes,

Dust to dust.

Like a phoenix, our country was born from violence.

And like a phoenix, we shall die from violence.