What can I say about
acts of steel hard hate that take
these precious lives away,
that take these fragile pulsing souls
in a storm that’s icey cold like hail?

I can do nothing but wonder
about what turns the human
to the alien, and the man
to the beast that lives by
fear and hate alone, and must,
in the cause that consumes
his soul in fire, be other than the
person he might have been.

And in the wake of acts that
rippled out with horror on the screen,
I feel the dread and I think of loss
and pain and grief beyond what
any one can bear alone, and must,
in the searing memories of this day,
be borne by all, and shared together
in common love and sorrow humanwide.

For Christchurch

16/3/2019