Shamir Terrel Palmer, 24, of Ridgeville, South Carolina
Hope Smith said her son heard gun shots, and when they got outside, they saw gunsmoke and nothing but blue lights.
She was surprised it happened there, in that neighborhood. Mike Vanaxen, meanwhile, says the suspect drove into his
home; the brick on the exterior of the house crumbled.
Your car razed the brick wall of that house, Shamir,
but your death has razed the walls of someone’s life,
crumbled them to unrecognizable pieces: maybe your mother waiting up
for you or your uncle home on leave, maybe some
English teacher from ninth grade grieves you tonight, like me.
I wish I had you in class and we’d fought
over reading Mockingbird. You’d grin slyly, in the third row,
ducking your head under your hand at my over-the-top antics,
or maybe you’d fuss, defiant and frustrated in the front,
Ain’t setting there, you’d say, I don’t mean no disrespect.
Your family plans to release a statement, some loving words
to set you free from suspect and weapon and high-speed-chase,
but nothing’ll bring you back whole. Whole is a thing
of the distant past now, unremembered from this day forward.
I think about you being swept up, little brick pieces
like all our dead, the shards of you collected tenderly
by loved ones. Soon, they will receive your autopsied remains
and the possessions you will have left behind you, untended
bits they’ll comb through, looking for you, looking for you
lost that night in a surprising neighborhood filled with blue lights.