Requiem

for Nikki Elias

He kicked the door in.

             let her name be blessed

A restraining order folded in her drawer,

             let her name be praised

a stalking order filed,

             her name be glorified

two security guards at the elementary school.

             name be lifted up

Her two girls were hiding.

             be graced in beauty

He shot her with an arrow.

             ascend in joy

She was buried under a freezing rain.

             let her name ascend in joy

He shot her with a gun.

             her name be graced in beauty

Her two girls were watching.

             let her name be lifted up

Extra security was at their school.

             let her name be

A stalking order.

             let her name

A restraining order.

             let her

He kicked the door in.

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Pam Crow is an award-winning poet who lives in Portland, Oregon where she works as a clinical social worker. Pam’s work has been published or is forthcoming in Plume, Carolina Quarterly, Southern Poetry Review, Ploughshares, and other national journals. She is the winner of the Astraea Emerging Lesbian Writers award and the Neil Shepard award for poetry. Her book Inside This House was published by Main Street Rag press in 2008.