Broken Pavement and Strobes

Midday rains slicken the avenue
As umbrellas bloom
Along the financial district
Like mushrooms on the forest floor.

The city murmurs business here
But further south
Where broken pavement mimics
Broken lives
There is boredom
Bluster
Violence
And death.

Blue strobes flash from cruisers
Red from ambulances
And fire trucks.

Twenty blocks divide
The wealthy
From the broken.

She was six years old
Sitting on her front porch.
He was fourteen
Walking to his grandmother’s
For dinner.
She was an honor student
Huddled with friends.
She was six weeks old
And her father was changing her diapers.

These children
And hundreds more
Were shot and killed
In one of the most elegant
But violent cities of the world.

The innocent dead stare from the tomb
Their blood on our hands.
How may we celebrate our gain
As we bury our loss?

Perhaps that is not rain falling
In the financial district.

It is God weeping.