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If I die in a mass shooting

Parade my corpse around the Capitol

And don’t you dare use any embalmer’s wax

Let them see the after, not the before of

What their inaction has done.

If I die in a mass shooting

Give my eyes to a Senator

That he may see the harm he caused

To everyone and everything

For want of a dollar.

If I die in a mass shooting

Give my ears to a Congressman

That he might forever hear the cries of mothers

Whose children died at the end of a gun barrel

Afraid, bloody, and screaming.

If I die in a mass shooting

Give my cold dead hands to the NRA

Rigor mortified, clutching a check

So they might actually listen for once.

If I die in a mass shooting

Give my heart to my fellow man

With apologies for not having done

Enough to stop all this.

If I die in a mass shooting

Burn me on a pyre outside the White House

So that the greasy smoke of cremation

Forever slickens its walls and windows,

So the soot that was someone lingers long.

If I die in a mass shooting

Spread my ashes on the steps of the Capitol

So that apathetic legislators, bloated with greed

Have to carry a bit of me with them to work every single day

Even if it is on the soles of their expensive shoes.