[40] Summer after the Coup, Frank C. Modica

Before Easter the days are always bleak,
the nights frigid and wind-whipped.

Mind numbing words stampede summer into fall,
Mass shootings worry people off the streets.

In community schools fear grips
the backpacks of everyone’s children.

Now is the time for the families and friends
of all our communities to speak truth to the lies,

now is the time for poets to become prophets of hope,
proclaim words to stop the carnage, bind the wounds.

We will not mourn the losing of our children.
We will bring back all our springs and summers.