Tribute

Stealth.

It comes in the night.

It comes when we look for it;

It comes when we don’t.

In the midst of laplis anpil (much rain),

A mixture of shouts and tears

Pierce through the downpour,

Mix themselves in.

Next door a life is taken.

Next door a loss is mourned.

At 9pm on a Monday night,

A body is driven to the morgue.

I was in the bathroom,

Reading how Saul’s jealousy 
Drove him to order his son to

Assist in Jonathan’s BFF’s death.

From outside, the soothing sounds of

Steadily stampeding raindrops

Were overpowered by bloodcurdling screams,

Pouring out their love on the lost.

I walked outside and called for John,

Hoping that this loyal guard would know

Something I didn’t know.

Mouri, he pronounced: Death.

Just a month ago, this letter combination,

Meant nothing to me as Venise uttered it.

My moto driver explained that

Lamar had died, was murdered.

Two weeks later I found myself

Pressed beside familiar people from Swasant-Kenz,

Paying tribute to their beloved friend, father, lover.

He’d been murdered by a hired hit man…

…over a plot of land.

His widow is pregnant with his 3^rd child.

John now tells me to wait while he

Peers over our wall to see who has passed,

But when he returns, he announces the

Body has already been covered.

Breath fills the lungs, oxygen knows

Where to go.

When the heart forgets how to beat,

It’s hard to accept the lifeless body left behind.

Into what eternity has this soul been swept?

Into what destiny will this loved one ascend?

How can we reach out

And pull lives towards the grace-rooted tree of life?

How can the night be transformed into light?

Resurrection has brought everlasting life.