Flumes Volume 2: Issue 1, Summer 2017 | Page 102

Poem 413

by Laurie Hesed

There were shootings last night

four different places,

beginning about two miles

from where I live,

and moving northwest,

down the road

to the next town

where my son and his family live.

Four people were killed,

fifteen injured, some critically.

It happened around suppertime,

while I was cooking,

while all the folks

in our towns were headed home,

or already there,

or in the second shift

at the lawnmower factory

where the shooter worked

and went to wound and kill.

The first responder was a policeman,

who “took down” the shooter

and stopped the carnage.

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