Orange Isn't Enough

Orange Isn't Enough
(c) Rabbi Menachem Creditor

Can a color change the world? 
It cannot bring back the dead. 
For those do I weep...

And yet we all know how little weeping will do.
If tears had the power to make the difference, 
there would be no more suffering.

Guns. Wretched, terrible things.
Money. Horrible, corrupting thing.

These Orange images,
fierce eyes, lit landmarks,
survivors, children,
scarred by Gun Violence

over and over and over 
and over and over and 
over and over and over 
and...

and.

We will wear the color of the hunted.
We are all, each, all
hunted.

Hunted by the responsibility to end madness,
the idolatry of a weapon.

Our American culture is being twisted by the scared,
manipulated by greedy, faceless, gunmakers
and weak, bought politicians.

To say it is enough is to say too little.
It is more than enough.
It was always too much.

To say enough with every next Gun Violence death 
is a national blasphemy.

Offering tears and prayers.
Posting updates, 
temporarily change your color one day a year
is habituated enabling.

To what should we say enough?
To our patience with 91 Gun Violence deaths every year, 
3 Newtowns a day.

To what should we say enough?
to standing still and silent,
to allowing ourselves to become numb.

If 128 school shootings since Sandy Hook 
haven't already brought every elected official 
to take responsibility for society's welfare
to be repulsed by our uniquely American gun-fetish culture
to say no to the NRA,
then there is one more place to say enough.

Enough of you. It's time for leaders who save lives.

And, dear sisters and brothers, if you vote for someone who isn't clear on Gun Violence, then it's on you. On us.

Some are guilty,
but, in a democracy,
all are responsible.

God's images are needlessly dying every day,
hurting themselves and others.

Enough.