Terri Schiavo

I wrote this poem a few years ago.

Terri Schiavo

I was watching the news on tv one day,       
in the bed a girl named Terri lay.
Surrounded by her were family and friends,
fighting for her life until the bitter end.
Amongst all the hype and controversy,
with no living will they’re begging for mercy.

Doctors believe she will feel no pain,
as they remove the feeding tube from her vein.
How do they know? Is it based on science?
Or is it some kind of political nonsense?
How could they starve her? Her vital signs were there.
I saw her smiling on tv when the news had been aired.

Rallies and vigils all up and down the block,
in one last attempt to stop the clock.
Appeals are being denied to them
day after day after day.
Time is too precious to be
ticking and ticking and ticking away.

Police rush to the hospice as quick as a blink,
arresting people who come to give Terri a drink.
The right to fight for life and not to die
should be a cause worthy to justify.
Here and now the right to life law doesn’t exist,
we have prisoners being treated better than this.

Now she has died and will not awake,
this was a murder, not a mistake.
It’s not the first time, and won’t be the last,
it’ll happen again, re-enacting the past.
This just proves, it all goes to show,
that we were then and still now, government owned.

Searching for answers and a compromise,
we need to enact a law so nobody dies.
Before I leave, I want you to know,
rest in peace, we love you, Terri Schiavo.
 

-Lisa M. Andrade