finding words

Just twenty-four hours ago, so much changed. 
My heart feels twisted with vulnerability
when I look at the faces of my children,
with a kind of selfish hunger for them,
for their smiles and beating hearts. 

I feel a physical longing
to hold those mothers and fathers
in Connecticut.  To wrap them in my arms
and cry with them, these strangers
whose love I know...even if I can only
imagine their devastation
this morning. 

It must seem
like a dream.

I think of those children,
those children that were just like mine.

This loss belongs to all of us.
We need to mourn,
to teach love in the face of sorrow
and to hold each other up
through the soul-wrenching losses
and the new day
that begins before
we are ready.