February Ground

February Ground

As the snow melts into the cold February ground, water flows down the drain pipes outside.

It sounds as if the house is crying.

A preacher without a pulpit preaches sermons in her head. She studies scripture and looks at the world and then tells herself all about it.

Today she is preaching to herself about a man named Judas. A man who said he loved what was right and good, he followed a Savior. Judas was going to help make the world great again.

But the murderers got a hold of Judas and said, “We need to know who he is, the Savior. He must die. They made a plan.

Judas had thirty pieces of silver jangling in his pocket when he kissed the Savior right in front of everyone. The murderers watched. They took the kissed man and killed the Savior dead.

And the world shuddered and sobbed oceans of grief.

A sister without a brother thinks about what a world without guns would be like. God’s Holy Mountain? Swords beaten into plowshares? Someplace nice?

But when things weren’t going right in her brother’s head, when pain and confusion reigned, he took a gun, a gun no one should have sold him, and shot himself dead.

And tears came down. Like snow sliding off a roof onto the cold February ground.

A writer without words, writes anyway. She creates a world where life is redeemed. Where a brother lives and breathes, and just maybe she can soothe her mother’s half-empty heart a bit. She writes about a Savior who didn’t stay dead.

The preacher/sister/writer watches the world. She watches the people who have power to change things for the better.

Then she watches breathlessly when mothers and fathers lose their hearts because their children have been shot dead.

When the people with power put on their oh, so, so sad faces for television and say they are praying for the families. Empty prayers from vacant souls. 

The preacher/sister/writer can hear the silver jangling in their pockets. NRA silver jangles and jangles and jangles until she thinks she’s going deaf.

And she screams, “Just do one damn thing to keep our children from being shot dead.”

Because she sees you, all the ones with the power to change things. You held that rifle yesterday. Your finger pulled the trigger. Yes. You.

And waterfalls rush down, because the world is crying.

So, to all the powerful ones who will go home to their families this weekend with silver in their pockets, make sure to hug your children. Enjoy their company. Count your silver – your blood money. Continue to do nothing to make this nightmare go away. Just go around and around and around.

While other parents, the ones with shredded hearts, lay their children in the cold February ground.