We Do Not Live In Terror by Christian Gould

Leave your body at the door.

Wield the golden chalice; our spirits,

Soft like candlelight filling any void

Left over from Orlando’s tragedy.

Let our spirits drink the life granted,

Golden platelets shifting from start to start;

Remember those who shed their bodies,

To become sparks of heaven to cover our heads,

With a crown of safe harbor.

Finding a light through the darkness;

They thought they were safe, living in the light,

And they lived well.

We are all souls, our safety is sacred.

Aglow, why should we fear the dark?

We are not helpless, we deserve to live,

To live well without fear of death;

Or worse: to be helpless, to be hopeless.

Orlando’s sunshine will break through the darkness.

The sun still rises and sets,

And so will we, ablaze in life’s candle flame.

Let the petals of hope open,

Like a door to a sacred spring,

For deep down, darkness is ashamed of itself,

It finds nothing but the ruin it creates.

Those who have fallen, not just in Orlando,

But in Paris, in 9/11, in every tragedy,

They remain alive in our hearts:

I think they watch us, cheering us on from beyond,

Saying: Do what you can,

This is the moment,

someone’s moment was filled with fear:

Fear without cause, or reason,

These are our moments, our lives.

Combat this with the weight of our words,

Our action - together we are THE GENERATION,

Young or old - And someone who kills is a shell,

Waiting to be cracked; there is no divide,

People have died, people keep dying!

We are not fragments - the past becomes our present,

And at present we don’t need permission to live.

Because look at us, at what we make ---

No tragedy can take our spirits,

Or our memories, our smiles,

Our tears: we say, no more death,

No more needless violence!

And why? Because we are the life,

The killers do not have, we were born into liberty,

And they want to take it.

Let us fight for it,

Our voices are the key to the gateway of eternity,

Limit is not our aim.

We will not give in, we are not helpless.

I am only one voice, but I know my strength,

And we make each other stronger.

Liberty is a poetry all of us can taste.

This is to Orlando, to Paris, to all of those lost.

Let us honor the memories and cherish them.

But we are not afraid,

The world is too beautiful, too vibrant.

We are not going to live in fear,

We are too pure for that.

We Do Not Live In Terror: by Christian Gould