I Once Had

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I Once Had So Much

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I once had a picnic on the beach

Not so much anymore. 

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I once had a kite it flew so high it disappeared 

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a kitten named Oscar

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a bike I rode so fast 

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a home in the hills

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a sister who was beautiful 

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a mom and dad

Not so much anymore. 

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I once had a life in the sun

Not so much anymore.

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I once had sweet dreams and red licorice

Not so much anymore. 

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I once had a heart that loved

Not so much anymore.

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I once had a family I adored

Not so much anymore. 

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I once had a gun that was loaded

Not so much anymore.

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I once was alive and free

Not so much anymore. 

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I once was a boy who had dreams

Not so much anymore.

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A Tragic Story

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This is a tragic poem about a little boy who once had a family and everything in life that he loved. A sister, a kitten, a loving home. His mind shattered and broke one day. He took the life of his entire family. Including the kitten. He was only ten years old. 

No one really knows what happened that day. How such a tragic event unfolded. 

The police arrived after a call from a frantic grandmother. It was her turn to babysit his little sister. She walked into a house filled with silence that wasn’t quite right. She found her grandson sitting in the rocker with a gun in his lap and blood on his clothes.

He hasn’t spoken a word since she found him. He only hums a little tune. The house is eerily quiet except for his humming. The sound crawls up her spine invoking a terror as she looks in his eyes. An emptiness looks back at her, there is no one there, nothing to see. There was no forewarning, there was nothing amiss. Nothing the boy said, or nothing he did. 

It’s tragic and true. It’s sad and disturbing. His mind is no more. His face is a canvas with no paint. 

He cannot take it back, it’s over and done. He can only sit in this chair and rock back and forth. He hums a tune he knows well. He’s heard it before. His sister requests it as she lays down to sleep. He knows if he stops humming his world as he knows it will fall apart. So, he keeps humming and rocking. 

The days turn into night, and the night turns into days. He still rocks and hums. He knows nothing else. A family forgotten; his grandmother knows. She visits him daily. She tries to reach inside and connect with his soul. She doesn’t know this, but he isn’t there anymore. He left long ago and will never return. He is a shell of the boy she once knew. She searches for answers. She will find none here. He’s not the grandson she held in her arms.  She doesn’t understand. It’s astonishingly sad and the anguish on her face lingers as she heads out the door. Nothing accomplished and nothing gained. Rock and hum, rock and hum. An eerily haunting familiar tune.

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Have you ever woken up in the early morning with words in your head? The need to write them down was urgent, so I did.

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It’s 4:30 in the morning. This is where my mind went. Enjoy your day.

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