Breaking News…Again

NCF Office – June 20, 2023 4 Comments

Sometimes the headlines paralyze us. What can we do? Laura Lindeman is a middle school teacher and poet, parent and friend, longtime member of NCF– bearing witness and providing presence. May her words touch your heart and inspire your prayers. -Renée

This piece, while about a particular pair of students, represents several others.  Some of the gun violence in our community – and our country – is also a descendent of slavery, jim crow and mass incarceration.  I greatly appreciated the teaching Jeff shared on Sunday.  One of the actions I am able to take is to write and share the writing.

Breaking News…Again

I know the victim!
knew…
Time in suspension 
For his extravagant antics:
Bouncing down halls,
Bouncing words at teachers,
Bouncing a few punches 
    off the faces of his peers.
But his smile races through a room 
Like lightening!
Dreds dancing on his head with the energy of a
Superbowl halftime show…
He was mischief and enthusiasm and zest!
But living in danger
His speed and agility 
Weaving through the violence
Not enough to protect him from the turbulence
Of generations of white oppression’s
Black destruction.
Armed by his family
False security in his sagging waistband.
At Sixteen – just smart enough 
To make irrational risk 
Look adventurous.
Maybe this is why there used to be 
Curfews?
Reasoning of the prefrontal cortex not fully formed 
For another half dozen years;
Which he won’t experience.
His unique weapon – fancy revolver
Not a secret.
Proudly waved 
Like a flag…
Or a dare.
During the next news cycle
I realize
I also know the shooter.
He took the dare;
Captured the flag.
Wanted the weapon of his friend.
Like two-year-olds in a sandbox
Tusseling over a Tonka Truck.
What did they say?
“Mine.”
“Mine!”
“Give it!”
Bang…
Silence.
I know the shooter.
Smart, articulate
First year in middle school
Studying with headphones – beats he called them.
Asking deep questions
Seeking complex answers
Quoting Tupac and Jay-Z
But survival on his block
Translated school as
“White people shit”.
Uncool
Only slick, stark, self-preservation
Was rewarded there.
The Seventh Sense
Of street survival.
Cutting classes,
Cursing teachers,
Curtailing disrespect from peers
At all costs.
Take what you want!
Command the room
          the block
          the bitches
          the boys.
So when he wants his bro’s gun,
    He takes the weapon;
    Takes the shot;
    Takes the life.
    Takes the arrest,
        The parole violation.
Takes his OG’s soul
    Her head in her hands in the court room.
Takes residence in a cell
    No bail.
Takes all of this at the cost of his youth,
His potential.
Barely a teenager
Playing adult games 
And losing.
Losing high school,
And chess club.
Losing a driver’s license and 
The right to vote.
Losing his siblings and 
His chance to age.
If tried and convicted as an adult
He’ll be incarcerated 45 to life.
Either way, life will be the sentence.
For the rest of his years, days, hours and moments
He will be dogged by the memory and 
Haunted by the choices 
He didn’t make:
    To walk away,
    To let go of the gun,
    To put friendship over face-saving
And laugh at his own pretension
Stuck at fourteen forever.
Trauma imprints
Even if denied by bluster
He can’t out-run
    out-shout
    out-shoot
    or fake out
His own fledgling soul.
I knew the victim;
I know the shooter.
Again.
The news cycles cycle on…

By Laura Lindeman 4/4/23