Quin Killin’

Legacies

When a person creates life, they are called a mother
but when a building is the foundation for that child’s development,
it’s hard not to consider them my babies just the same.
I have been with them since the first formed memories.
Their first friend. Their first crush.
The first lesson in surviving social jungles.
The first leap of faith when they play hooky during 3rd period.

I was the first safe haven they had
until I was their last…
Their last cry in the bathroom as they screamed for their mother.
Their last breath in a pool of blood on the concrete of a breezeway.
I broke brick and bone to make room for my babies
only for my body to be made into a death trap and
I tried to protect them as a mother should,
tried to hide them in the folds of my safe spaces,
made my walls thick enough to shield them from ricochets and
locked doors that kept them from the range of a shotgun–
I thought I could protect them but
I can still hear their screams echoing through my chest.

Is it not the burden of a mother to give her children the world
only to watch in fear when someone crushes it?
Is being a mother as a permanent as they say it is or
is it pending the withdrawal of a child’s life?

When a newborn dies before 20 weeks,
it is known as a spontaneous abortion.
When an intruder interrupts a nine month school year,
we call it Columbine.
We call it Virginia Tech.
We call it Robb Elementary.
We call it everything except sterilization.
People say the children are our future
but do nothing to stop them from becoming hashtagged into history.
It’s hard to feel like anything more than a mortuary
with all these unclaimed miscarriages in my womb.

I don’t know which hurts worse:
being riddled with bullets or riddled with guilt.
My babies needed a savior but I am no Jesus.
I have no resurrection to offer them.
I tried my best to hold them holy
but the bodies keep slipping through the bullet holes in my hands.

You wonder why your thoughts and prayers don’t mean a thing…
They don’t protect my babies from your negligence.
They don’t clean up this crime scene you made of me.
This is your fault!
Every one of you that would rather ban books
to shield children from hidden truths
but not the guns that turn my libraries into graveyards.
Now, instead of autographing yearbooks,
I have death certificates to sign on lockers in .32 caliber cursive.

When a child is taken from this life before having a chance to live it,
we call it unfair.
When a mother is distraught after losing the life they’ve birthed,
it is called grief,
but when I am a school house that made itself a home
for the life that was taken unfairly…
a building that birthed experiences and personalities
now filled with still framed smiles and blood stained dreams…
Do I get to call this unfair?
Do I get to call this grief
when mourning children I didn’t bring into this world?
Am I allowed to feel anything at all?
Because if not,
I do not know what to call this then.

 

Quin Killin’ is a poet, advocate, and performer who brings Liberty City, Miami with them everywhere they go. They have had their works featured on platforms such as African Writer, Button Poetry, The Bitchin’ Kitsch, and WUSF Arts Axis and is the current editor-in-chief of The Blunt Space’s digital literary magazine, Defiance and Dialogue. With an MFA in Creative Writing from Stetson University, they live life as a part-time blerd, a full-time AuDHD, introverted Negro, and moonlights as a comedic, smart mouth. Quin can be found on Substack @queenybihh, Spill & Instagram @queeny_bihh, and YouTube @Quin Killin The Poet.

 

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