Bruce and Dana
Bruce and Dana were gunned down across the street from us April 11, just a little after midnight. As Ernie and I were going to bed, I heard his mother screaming in the street so we quickly ran out the door. We took Grandpa and the rest of the family into our home that night because everyone had to be interviewed by the police. They had no where to go except into the street, into the coldest night of their lives.
The family gave Ernie and I a huge bouquet of white roses and thank you notes signed "we love you." That night was the first time we had met some of them but the rudimentary feelings of love and kindness were flowing from my husband and I that night and my sister said "you were their angels doing God's work" which is so humbling. And still I grieve and cry.
Bruce's Petals
Too soon cut from the stock
A once fresh bouquet
of white roses
surrounded by baby's breath
now
standing still in a vase
reverently
wilting,
browning,
falling
And the rain drops
the next morning
fell like the tears
of your family
that night
only more slowly
glistening, clinging
to branches, the
droplets sparkled in
the sheerness of the air
the sun glared
painfully into this
heavy feeling that
could not rise
to greet this show of
beauty
For he executed you
and your lady
He emptied 15
rounds into
both of you
starkly
bluntly
brutally
Your family
flowed into our home
a river of agony
as the rain
misted them
dampening them further
we don't leave
our neighbors
in the rain
A yellow ribbon
went around
the house, the vehicles
a home an hour ago
the police
the detectives
the chaplain
we spent the
night together
we shared
your shock
your horror
your excruciating disbelief
for you were all
bludgeoned with no hope
"Bruce was murdered
Bruce was killed
Someone killed my son"
His mother, his sister, his father
his uncles, aunts, cousins, his grandpa,
his in-laws paced in and out
suffocated by pain
needing air
The killer turned himself in
that night, her ex-husband
of 5 years after following her
to Grandpa and Bruce's home
talked to
them about cheating then
shot them dead
The killer's children numbly suffer
The killed mother's children suffer
All who loved them suffer
All who liked them suffer
All who cared, served, knew, worked with,
laughed with, played with
suffer
Bruce's petals are drying
in a bowl
in the sun
along with
our petals
that fell down
that night........
Copyright Rozanna Landavazo 2011
