ANGELS ARE WEEPING AGAIN

I can hear them weeping again, those particular angels
that cry for the children
They gather en masse and form an unholy choir and the
sound they produce
Is not like anything earthly; once you've heard it, you'll
never forget , nor will you
Want to hear it again, as long as you live, but you will

I wasn't paying attention the first time his face flickered
across the screen on my TV
But some part of my monkey brain must have stored it
because as soon as I heard the weeping
I knew for whom it was  - the red-headed child...I just
knew it...
I turned up the sound on my TV and tried not to think of
dead babies, mute swans, and all the sadness

That things of this nature bring about, but before I could stop it,
the story came on
A three year old child had been beaten to death in the most
heinous manner...
The ultimate reason? He would not eat his breakfast...

Expecting to hear that this poor baby had been stolen,
kidnapped, or abandoned
And this was the terrible outcome of that...
Through a haze of red rage, I learned it was his mother...
his MOTHER and her boyfriend that had
Hung the boy upside down, beat him with numerous
articles - whips, aluminum strips, a curtain rod...
Laughing all the while (his brother, also abused, lived to
to tell the tale...my God)

When he wasn't hung upside down, he was duct-taped
to a chair, or lying unconscious on an air-mattress.
Again, Scotty McMillan was three years old.

Oh angels who weep, drown me if you will...I may not
make it through the night.