Written by Terri Watrous Berry
for Shaka Sankofa, previously Gary Graham
A man counts minutes in Texas,
well into his last lone star afternoon.
This Michigan mother now counts
the minutes until six o’clock,
six o’clock today belongs to him,
thanks CNN, and I hope his
time is better spent than mine, this
slashing and trashing of words
incapable of spelling out
my outrage and my shame.
Who gives this right, who claims
the right to kill a man in Texas today
for a boy’s alleged deed—
was he even nineteen?—
nineteen years ago, Texas?
You already missed your chance to
kill the boy who may have killed
that man, both are already gone.
Any of you Texans who you were
nineteen years ago today?
In Michigan I pray God might
find a way to forgive
Texas.
.
Terri Watrous Berry is a Michigan septuagenarian. During this past year her poetry was included by, among others, Monterey Poetry Review, London Arts Based Research Centre, Ivo Review, Moss Piglet, and Red Rose Thorns, who nominated her for a Pushcart Prize. Upcoming are poems in anthologies by Code Blue Publishing and Longship Press.