Reading · Multipotentialite HQ

Three years ago, I checked in on the world to find a parent’s nightmare playing out on YouTube… the Uvalde school shooting. Parents were gathering and, in some cases, handcuffed to prevent them from entering where the police feared to tread. Fear took the day, and 22 died.

Gun violence fact. Each day 12 children die from gun violence in America. Another 32 are shot and injured. — Source: Sandy Hook Promise

I composed a poem of protest and pain in response, crying as I wrote it. It was not the first, and it won’t be the last school shooting. But at least we could try to do something about it.

For the ignominious third anniversary, I have decided to release the poem in audio and video. The video does not show a crazy writer bawling like a baby, as I did again when making the slide show. Instead, it is a slide show about gun violence and Texas’ continuing “response” as one of the leading states in the number of school shootings or active shooters per year.

Remember the children with me. The children of Uvalde, TX, and Robb Elementary, but also the children of Columbine, Red Lake, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Covenant School, and the hundreds of other schools, colleges, and universities where unchecked killers indiscriminately slaughter our children because politicians can’t jeopardize their NRA rating or source of campaign funds.

My second act of protest, worn in the streets of Texas for a year after their murder, was inspired by Maite Rodriguez, a victim of Uvalde.

“We have to do more.” - President Joseph R. Biden

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"Do Nothing and Find Out"

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