New Mexico Mercury

For Sandra Ferrales, 10/17/80—10/6/13

What did we do
to deserve this beauty -- our blooming cactus flowers, the emerald green shine of our chiles, the boys
and girls the backbones of our families, taking a stab
at adulthood in middle school?  In a city of strong kids, under a sky so wide and this blue,
it’s as though we’re being showered
with praise by a gorgeously generous god.

On a street in the North Valley, where stray gods
jog amongst canneries and cottonwoods, where people do what they do,
in this case, in the bathroom of a house:  Sandra took a shower.
I can imagine her 12-year-old and her 6-year-old – two boys –
shunning that gift of our blue
sky outside to stay in, playing their video games:  shoot shoot, stab stab.

I was hiking in the mountains on the day of the stabbing,
whispering a prayer to God,
longing for a companion, feeling blue:
“Thank you for everything but what do I need to do
to find a nice man – they’re all boys,
you know?  I want a good man.”  Because I didn’t know Sandra was stepping into the shower,

trusting her safety for a moment.  She wasn’t thinking, “This is my last shower.
The restraining order didn’t work.  I’ll be stabbed.
What did I do today?  Did I yell at my boys, did I praise my boys?
Did I yell at God, did I praise God?
What did I just do? 
Did I take one, last look at the blue?”

Sandra, a friend of yours said “she prayed all the time” so when he appeared out of the blue
and when he dragged you from the shower,
what did you do
to deserve  one stab, 10 stabs, 50 stabs
more?  What did the boys do to deserve this horror and what did he do – this man, this God –
when he heard your prayers for you and for the boys?

Watching boys, calling 911 boy
Mom red, Mom dead, boys blue
Missing God
Screaming shower
Shower stabbing
Do

Something must’ve come up because God hasn’t sent me a man nor did he save you or our boys
from hearing their stabbed mom scream, from seeing her showered in crimson under our blue
sky.  I’ll be fine without mine, but Sandra:  Where was your God?