Category Archives: murder of the innocent

The borrowed child

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I once borrowed
A child/you could say
Lent.
She was lent to me
Because
her mother was a drug addict…I believed in the system…believed a caseworker…needed infinite
Light

This is not a poem.

She held the world in her eyes
And all the treasure I could have
Begged, borrowed, stolen
I would have traded for her

My in-between child

The little boy whose mother is a chalk angel
Lying beneath
The chaos of war

The little girl who believes the old man in the white car
Who does not really ever
Need her help to find a puppy

The baby glued to a wall
Broken like a vase on the hard stones
Another woman
Laid down on the floor

she would have been a good mother…

Monster.
It is the thing we call
A person who could do that to a child

My baby

He pulls the crystal bowl
Out as I am turned askew
Aside
Asunder

His father viewed this as s trinket
And did not hide it away
High where it could not be reached

Shatters in an instant
And we both
Stand amidst the shards

I say
It is not fair

And scoop him into arms
His siblings distract him from the wreckage

And I sweep up the mess.
Put poultices on the ground

Pretending for a moment
That there is a magic word
For love
Stronger than
Caustic
Glue

Girl
I would reach you
With my arms if I could
With my words if I must
Like walking on water
If I have to…

Resort to prayer.

Eclipse of Light

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It was a solar eclipse
Splashing darkness
Across half the earth
Like a child stretching his blanket
Across the bare
Wood staircase–
Upstairs young man!
His mother admonishes

Never realizing
His life is the smallest
Gossamer thread

From her life to mine

They say
if you try
To look
Directly into the sun
During an eclipse
Seek professional help

Do they mean scientists or
Psychology?

I won’t know.

I just
Know
That staring
Straight into the
Face of God himself
Is impossible hubris
Unless…
The shadow of the Cross
Shields the mortal
Eye

The Rain Dance

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I see the light
Pouring out
Over the lawn at night
The girls in their pretty
Dresses fan out in the lines
Demarcating light and darkness
Can you hear the haunting
Music?
I can
The strings of slow lament
The partygoers
Lurching toward the wrought
Iron gates
Boozy and fatigued
Wondering
who will show us the way home?

Toryn Buckman

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I became a foster parent because of stories like Toryn’s.  I quit foster parenting when I realized that the state of X was not in the business of rescuing the Toryns of the world.

I am not going to tell you what happened to her.  Google her.  I want you to read at least three articles about what happened to this precious little girl.  Then I want you to think about several things.

What is justice for Toryn?

Where does evil like this come from?

Where does it end?

Can we afford to wince and look away?

Are you sorry you read about her?  Was it a downer?  Would you rather have watched a juicy episode of Game of Thrones?  (Please don’t, by the way..)

Please understand me.  It is always easier to expect someone else to take care of the Toryn’s of the world, but it is impossible to believe no one suspected anything was wrong in the life of a child who was beaten to death over the course of at least six months.  What we do know is that no one saved her.

Let me repeat that again.

No one saved her.

 

As a christian I am as appalled by this story as most “normal” people–whatever their creed or belief.  But I have some answers for these questions, hard, difficult, stay up and pray and fast answers, but answers nonetheless.

My answers start with Matthew 18 and end with a River and a Tree for the healing of the nations.

And in the middle is a Man dying on the Cross of history, the rictus of pain for a little girl named Toryn and all of us.

Scarred Savior.  Scapegoat God.