How Many

I must confess,
I am no parent,
I do not know the pain
parents go through
when losing their blood.

I must confess,
I did not watch
the news
of Sandy Hook,
I talked about it
with my mom
on gchat briefly,
I must confess
I looked it up on
Google News afterwards.
26 dead, 20 children.
I must confess
it did not become
something I could feel
until my cousin said
this:
how many of them bought
their baby gifts for Christmas,
how many of them fought
that morning?
how many must regret
their last words,
or wish it had been something
meaningful.How many more parents
must go through this
or more,
because we can’t learn
to help those
who need it
before they do something
reckless and inhumanly
cruel,
how many more
children
must we lose
before we learn
to take away
the tools
of those troubled
and past the point of no
return?

How much more innocence
must our children lose
must we lose
before we all learn?