Shakespeare would run out of paper. A 6-year old smiles forever in her photo - she will never turn 7 today. Sometimes a young lady can tell you everything. Sometimes an adult can tell you nothing but pain emptied out with a trigger click. Today, Tiana is gone with nothing but her story for others to say. Tiana has lived her whole life in 6 some odd years and now she says bye.
She says bye to Saturday mornings full of cartoons, to her friends' Birthday parties and Chuck E Cheese. She says goodbye to ice cream in Moreno Valley on a hot August day. She says goodbye to her hair being stretched and pulled to her parents' delight. She must have been learning how to read and never will she read another word because of senseless violence.
If you want a depressing task, try reading a child's obituary. If you want a painstaking chore, try tracing the steps of a killer. There are millions of steps to trace. It is sad to look at the faces of the young victims of homicide. And all because certain people choose to channel their energy through guns, fists, drugs, knives and anything blunt that will cause great bodily injury - poetry with hatred. Tiana Ricks died on a celebratory Saturday night in the Moreno Valley area on September 7th, 2013.
When is enough, enough? Mistakes with pens kill papers. Mistakes with guns kill 6-year old daughters. All we can do is sit there and stew. Violence will climb into another one's heart before I finish this sentence. Violence will climb into another one's mind with sad, tragic consequence. *Solutions are elusive and complex.
Tonight, everyone who loves Tiana must do their own thing and keep their mind away from the absence. The absence of a little girl giggling at something she finds funny, hilarious. Tonight, Tiana's parents will have to fill that void with grief emptying out like a broken faucet - gushing and gashed. She might have been an asset to society but tonight she's a lullaby liability - just gone. A pair of small shoes will forever be left unfilled.
The complicated truth is simple to say: violence begets violence. How many people will ask the police for help? How many people will the police interrogate? How many scared kids will turn tattle-tellers? How many people will live in disgrace because someone else was brought to justice? How many killers get caught? Most times, a killer is caught by the bullet of another killer. Please God! Please, God, find a home for Tiana and her little shoes.
*Cities require clearly articulated violence prevention strategies to be adopted in the City's charter, guidelines and policies. Policing and prisons are not always the solution. Policing many times only throws more goons into murder investigations but some bad people do get put away - so there is some good in that. There is a problem with the way power is played out in City Councils everywhere. Your local City Council is corruptible, corrupted but they are there and might be caring - might. I'm cynical about City politics and human beings in general as people unfortunately lust for power not peace. Politics is sadly the arena in life where nothing happens. Talk is nothing while bullets maim and kill. Vigilantes come in all shapes and sizes. Everyone is compelled by good and bad motives - everyone! There are people out there keeping violence at bay but they are non-traditional leaders. They're grandmothers, mailmen, liquor store owners. They are older brothers and sisters. I know for a fact that as bad as things are they would be a lot worst if there weren't people doing good work - pouring their heart and soul to see people choose peace over violence. City governments are out of touch with the communities they supposedly represent. We need to go out there and talk to people. But not many know how to bridge generational gaps effectively . People simply get divided and go into their little corners and sulk in their divisions like that's the only box in which they can possibly exist. I give credit to Jah Shams Abdul-Mumin and Maryanne Galindo from SANBI for helping me outline these ideas.
She says bye to Saturday mornings full of cartoons, to her friends' Birthday parties and Chuck E Cheese. She says goodbye to ice cream in Moreno Valley on a hot August day. She says goodbye to her hair being stretched and pulled to her parents' delight. She must have been learning how to read and never will she read another word because of senseless violence.
If you want a depressing task, try reading a child's obituary. If you want a painstaking chore, try tracing the steps of a killer. There are millions of steps to trace. It is sad to look at the faces of the young victims of homicide. And all because certain people choose to channel their energy through guns, fists, drugs, knives and anything blunt that will cause great bodily injury - poetry with hatred. Tiana Ricks died on a celebratory Saturday night in the Moreno Valley area on September 7th, 2013.
When is enough, enough? Mistakes with pens kill papers. Mistakes with guns kill 6-year old daughters. All we can do is sit there and stew. Violence will climb into another one's heart before I finish this sentence. Violence will climb into another one's mind with sad, tragic consequence. *Solutions are elusive and complex.
Tonight, everyone who loves Tiana must do their own thing and keep their mind away from the absence. The absence of a little girl giggling at something she finds funny, hilarious. Tonight, Tiana's parents will have to fill that void with grief emptying out like a broken faucet - gushing and gashed. She might have been an asset to society but tonight she's a lullaby liability - just gone. A pair of small shoes will forever be left unfilled.
The complicated truth is simple to say: violence begets violence. How many people will ask the police for help? How many people will the police interrogate? How many scared kids will turn tattle-tellers? How many people will live in disgrace because someone else was brought to justice? How many killers get caught? Most times, a killer is caught by the bullet of another killer. Please God! Please, God, find a home for Tiana and her little shoes.
*Cities require clearly articulated violence prevention strategies to be adopted in the City's charter, guidelines and policies. Policing and prisons are not always the solution. Policing many times only throws more goons into murder investigations but some bad people do get put away - so there is some good in that. There is a problem with the way power is played out in City Councils everywhere. Your local City Council is corruptible, corrupted but they are there and might be caring - might. I'm cynical about City politics and human beings in general as people unfortunately lust for power not peace. Politics is sadly the arena in life where nothing happens. Talk is nothing while bullets maim and kill. Vigilantes come in all shapes and sizes. Everyone is compelled by good and bad motives - everyone! There are people out there keeping violence at bay but they are non-traditional leaders. They're grandmothers, mailmen, liquor store owners. They are older brothers and sisters. I know for a fact that as bad as things are they would be a lot worst if there weren't people doing good work - pouring their heart and soul to see people choose peace over violence. City governments are out of touch with the communities they supposedly represent. We need to go out there and talk to people. But not many know how to bridge generational gaps effectively . People simply get divided and go into their little corners and sulk in their divisions like that's the only box in which they can possibly exist. I give credit to Jah Shams Abdul-Mumin and Maryanne Galindo from SANBI for helping me outline these ideas.
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