ANOTHER DAY,  ANOTHER SHOOTING

Gunshots flame, and children

incinerate like smoke.

Parents plead for humanity—which doesn’t hear its name

and flits off to save the whales,

a safer endangered species.

Gunfire rips through fences, gates, and locks.

Places where people gather

are ripe for impromptu executions.

The flare-up of excuses—doused by thoughts and prayers.

And still gun sales thrive.

Guns sold and resold—a solid investment.

Fear and need eat like cancer.

Guns kill the pain—but, like all drugs,kill from the inside. 

Society’s caretakers shrug,

chanting a mantra revamped for profit:

the right to bear arms. 

Sunshine hums with voices of the newly-slaughtered

who no longer vote

and won’t get in the way.

Some leave tiny footprints,

tracking grief all over rugs and hearts.

Tiny footprints:

the cost of doing business.