Requiem

Written in response to the April 2007 Virginia Tech massacre.

Remember us not
For our lives' tragic ends;
Remember us, rather,
As friends of your friends.

Do not define us
As victims of fate;
We are only those
For whom help came to late.

Don't group us as one
For the fact that we died,
But recognize each
For the self deep inside.

Always remember
Hopes torn from our hearts
When from life we were sundered
Before we'd played our parts.

And never forget
That death no honor gives,
Other than that
Which is earned while one lives.

We had so many dreams,
We had so much to give,
And that burden now falls
On all those who still live.

So reach out to the world,
Be a part of life's song,
So the living recover,
Though our parting was wrong.