Posted by
FromtheArchepelago on Friday, February 08, 2008 3:16:50 PM
Summer's Child
In the year that Jessica Lunsford died, something died within me. I must ask your forgiveness for presenting some ideas "at her expense" and perhaps I seem a Philistine about the whole affair. This is not my intention. It is rather my desire to pay tribute to her and those we may name silently in our hearts who have and will suffer the vile, foul, deviant touch of a monster.
I have three girls, now grown, and four beautiful, outgoing granddaughters. I have three handsome grandsons. I can only relate to the agony of Jessica's father, in all its forms. by a knot in my stomach and chains on my heart. I don't dwell on the fear I feel for my own during "amber alerts".
The solstice is passed, we spin and hurtle toward another equinox. Along with the stars other, more sinister constellations align. That is, I mean to say, predator seeks prey. This alignment I call "Summer's Child".
It's stars are the brightest and most beautiful in the heavens. Their brilliance is such that they dazzle our eyes and hearts even in the most powerful light of the summer sun. In them is captured the essence of our heritage and the beauty and devilishness of their own contribution to another iteration. But now they only shine.
But as it happens constellations are not merely chains of diamonds in the sky. They glitter in a sea of blackness. This blackness is a darkness we rarely contemplate because of the awe in which we hold the stars. but the darkness, in the midst of daylight comes also to visit.
Suddenly, though only one star has been snatched from it's place, we feel the darkness at our own throats as the constellation falls from the sky and the scales enclose our eyes.
This piece has been in the "works" since Jessica Lunsford's story was told. Each day my heart longed to hear, "She's found". But as the sun slowed in its path and the nights became eternal she was swallowed in the blackness that had once revealed her glory.
Two things continue claw at my heart: first, the vision of a trashbag closing over my head, the impression being lowered into the earth, my chest burning as it struggles with life, the dying of my voice in the silence.
The second is more sinister. Having worked with pedophiles I know that the many facets of the maryrdom of a child will provide Mr. Cooey with a lifetime of secret joys. He will relive his favorite moments again and again, a little guilt, no remorse.This sickens and infuriates me. He has earned a much less friendly death than the one shining star in his own dark formation.
This is dedicated to all born under this troubled sign.