Who were they?
Four young girls
dressing in choir robes
within a church.
What was their crime?
They concealed within their cells
the wrong DNA,
too much pigment
in their skin.
What did they want?
They asked for respect,
their American rights,
to keep their dignity
and opportunity.
Their sentence:
Death by dynamite,
by men shrouded in
white robes
and hoods.
Executed this date,
no appeal.
Hal C Clark – April, 2011
We recently visited Birmingham, AL and explored the downtown area where we came upon the church where the bombing took place. I was saddened by the thought of the hatred that caused this tragic event. These four young girls never had a chance to grow up, have children of their own, or enjoy the progress in race relations to come. As William Stafford would say, it was a failure of compassion.
I have been away from this blog for a while, but I hope now to be posting new work each week.
Hal C Clark's Blog 