TRIGGER WARNING: vivid imagery regarding school shooting tragedy.
This spoken word piece describes what it was like going back to school after surviving a school shooting. Graphic in its depictions, this poem delineates the most raw and personal (all true) experiences students experienced returning after the Stoneman Douglas tragedy.
___
Preview
‘Let’s shift around our seats’
Says the teacher
‘We have to, we have to
To fill in the empty chair’
But they can never fill in that empty chair
At his dinner table
Or his family van
In his family’s heart
No, they can’t
Because-
‘We’ll have to make do’
Says another teacher
As she pushes a cart around too
Because her classroom scene
Has holes in the walls
Scarred by an AR15
That-
‘I get mad when I look at you. You look like her. And now she’s gone.’
Says a girl
Who cannot look me in the eyes
Because I remind her of someone to whom she never got to say goodbye
And-
To a bathroom we go
Giving you a tour of how it was—peer
Going back to the war zone
There’s sobbing in here
And now I’m hiding
Not my tears
But rather from another battle that’s here
Because the alarm is flashing and blaring it’s warning
That another fire will burn our souls
So a girl and I who aren’t even friends
Are holding onto each other
Because here we go again-
…..
Going back is-
It’s like walking into your nightmares every day
Echoes
Flashbacks play
Unimaginable dialogue of woes
Fire alarms pull us down like gravity
Yes this was our reality
…..
I can’t tell the truth
Because they shouldn’t have to hear
About a battle
That no one should be drafted to…
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This spoken word piece in its entirety…____
"What my lips can't say"
by Eleni Webster
“I have a question”
You say
“I don’t want to hear it”
Says my heart
“It’s gonna be dumb”
Says my brain
“Let’s hear it”
Say my lips
“What was it like going back?”
You ask
“Back to the war zone?”
Snaps my brain
“Back to the fiery torment and colosseum?”
It sasses
“Let’s see
Well
Every day
We’d walk through these doors
These red gates
Thinking ‘will the pain be forevermore?’*
We’d pass by angry faces
And shouts of contempt
Screaming ‘tie your laces!
Because you don’t wanna end up face down’
Never by the ground
So I stand tall
Face forward
Ready to battle it all
The ghost of ourselves from that day
My past self
She’s gone… gone away
But you want to know what remains?
I hear the echoes of the gunshots
Pa, pa, pa, pa
Rrr, a pa pa pa pa
I hear footsteps sprinting
I feel the vibration of the panic
Of the running
Boom, boom, boom, boom
I hear the chopper above
Trying to send blessings below
But all it did is cuff
My ears into hearing
What isn’t there
Chukuh, chukuh, chukuh, chukuh
I feel the squeeze of my hand
Blood no longer circulating there
Because my friend and I were holding onto the thought of our friends surviving
In the palms of our hands
So we squeezed our hands as tight as we could
Holding onto the thought that maybe
Maybe
They’ll be okay, they should
So my hand
Is numb
As I walk the plank
(The stairs above)
I hope that this is all fake
But I see sharks below
(Memories lined with caution tape)
Ready to end my sanity
(Is this really our reality?)
I hear not an echo of
But rather the current state, corrupt
What goes on on in this space
I hear crying in the bathrooms, I see tears ricochet off the same floor
That was soaked in the 17 lives—
‘I can’t be in this place’
Honestly 3300 lives and many more
Gone and what is forth
Is that there’s barking of dogs
And oinking of pigs
(I’m not joking)
Even a donkey trying to kick away our fears
So they bring a whole zoo
But forget what is true
Is that we will never be okay
And I’m grateful for the pups
That let us pet their souls up
But a zoo of animals
Won’t fix the instincts we’ve attained
To jump at every sound
And cry at every alarm
And shut down our emotions
Our brains and hearts going through the motions
Of surviving each day
Each hour
Each minute
Each second
In this horrid place
‘They put a gate up’
Said my friend
‘To hide the bloodstains
(Again I’m not joking)
Of a hero’s pains
Who tried to save our friends’
But they can’t put a fence around
The facts
The memories that haunt us
The memory of stepping over shattered glass
Plus
Hearing the pound
-ing of footsteps and heartbeats and all sorts of-
‘Let’s shift around our seats’
Says the teacher
‘We have to, we have to
To fill in the empty chair’
But they can never fill in that empty chair
At his dinner table
Or his family van
In his family’s heart
No, they can’t
Because-
‘We’ll have to make do’
Says another teacher
As she pushes a cart around
Because her classroom scene
Has holes in the walls
Scarred by an AR15
That-
‘I get mad when I look at you. You look like her. And now she’s gone.’
Says a girl
Who cannot look me in the eyes
Because I remind her of someone to whom she never got to say goodbye
And-
To a bathroom we go
Giving you a tour of how it was—peer
Going back to the war zone
There’s sobbing in here
And now I’m hiding
Not my tears
But rather from another war
Because the alarm is flashing and blaring it’s warning
That another fire will burn our souls
So a girl and I who aren’t even friends
Are holding onto each other
Because here we go again-
Smoky vision and blurry sounds
And loud thoughts
Over and over again
Because that day the fire alarm went
And now it gets triggered too
And takes its revenge on us, blue
Our hearts and tears
As it plays it’s horror song
Waah, waah
It cries and-
So in summary
Going back is-
It’s like walking into your nightmares every day
Echoes
Flashbacks play
Unimaginable dialogue of woes
Fire alarms pull us down like gravity
Yes this was our reality
And you know what?
There’s also-“
Says my brain
Says my heart
But “It was hard”
Is all that escapes my lips
“I’m so sorry”
You say
Not knowing that I’m sorry
That I can’t tell you all of what it’s like
Walking back into battle
In a war zone
In a zoo
In a colosseum too
In my brain
In my heart
In a conversation
With a friend
Who I can’t tell
The truth
Because they shouldn’t have to hear
About a battle
That no one should be drafted to…
Not even in their imagination
So “it was difficult”
Is all my lips can catapult
And all I can say
Is this here today
It was war
With ourselves
With the system
There’s no door
That conceals
What we feel
Cannon fire
It is dire
It was war.
*Reference to the lyrics of my song, "Eagles Again."
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