Saturday, November 18, 2023

THE BANALITY OF MASS SHOOTINGS

by Julie A. Dickson


Photo from “Terror on Repeat: A rare look at the devastation caused by AR-15 shootings” in The Washington Post, November 16, 2023. WaPo Editor’s note: The photos, videos and personal accounts [in the report] are extremely disturbing and may be too upsetting for some people.


Repetition in media, another shooting
should sound as old news, except that
tragic loss of life keeps occurring, 
 
more automatic weapons in the hands
of unstable, unhappy humans;
we should have realized, they say
 
each time,  the signs were all there,
an uprising follows: gun rights for some,
while others weep redundantly each time
 
more are shot. The banality of killings,
mass slaughter should lead to change,
not complacency and resignation.


Julie A. Dickson regularly submits to online and printed journals. Her poetry is seen in over 70 journals, including Blue Heron Review, Hotel of Broken Hearts, Ekphrastic Review, and The New Verse News. She writes from art prompts, current events, nature and environment. Her elephant poems help to advocate for captive zoo and circus elephants to be sent to sanctuaries. Dickson holds a BPS in Behavioral Science and shares her home with two rescued feral cats.