Alejo Rovira Goldner

Mother Emanuel AME Church, June 17, 2015 

That night of thousands of candles
faces in a state of emergency
a lady we didn’t know crying  
behind a frenzy of siren lights  

People were asking what did
those servants of God do wrong
people ran but there wasn’t anywhere to run
they saw him who had the look of 
who is there that doesn’t love a lynching
that nothingness face that smudge face that’s Satan
that night of thousands of candles

He made the account
that they should drop like cattle
brothers and sisters trying to listen
brothers and sisters trying to listen for a pulse 
sisters brothers trying but it was like their minds clattered
the scrawny boy the Fiend guessed well
how to aim kill a right hand kill an eye a forearm
because it’s easy to murder a right arm and a cheek
if you have a Glock growing out of your rib 

How gunshots make a river
why can’t we wake them
allow me officer through the window to hold her
did those people in church do anything wrong  
that night of thousands of candles blazing
Clementa Cynthia Suzie Ethel Depayne
Myra Sharonda Daniel Tywanza
the scrawny blank boy laughed  
the scrawny boy said Eeny Meeny 
then ruled they should be stamped out  
grasshoppers in a ditch  

But after the massacre 
an ash cloud rose over Charleston 
formed faces soldiers ministers

Listen for a pulse it’ll come listen
what if he’d used arrows not bullets  
I could’ve tackled him I could’ve truly

Air-birds fluttered near the steeple that graced
this mountain bloating with human crime

People ran but there wasn’t anywhere
let’s climb up through the open sky
pull them back they can’t be shot that bad 

That night of thousands of candles blazing
a choir path through Charleston

Alejo Rovira Goldner is a Los Angeles poet, aka Alex M. Frankel, who writes poems by manipulating pre-existing texts.