(Also read at the Student Reading on Wednesday by ko shin
He heard three shots. It was late and given where he lived, not unusual. The shots were close; at least they felt that way. Jimmy ran to the window and carefully pushed the curtain back and saw a body lying on the sidewalk, just down the block from his two-up. He ran to call 911, but the sirens were already loud, maybe coming just around the corner from the precinct.
He ran back and took one more look, Oh god he thought, that looks like Ali, his high school friend and classmate.
He grabbed his coat and ran down the stairs and out into the street. Ali was gone, dead at a very young age.
Jimmy knew that Ali and his family were often the brunt of cultural & religious hatred. It seems, people, if they meet someone different, think their dangerous, or something. Since 9/11 it had gotten worse. “Why? Why my friend, was a Muslim?” The Hood was so culturally mixed. “It doesn’t make sense” He thought.
It was a sad night, Jimmy hardly slept as I am sure as his neighbors experienced the same sense of fear, loneliness and anger. Everyone knew that someone in the hood was not happy with an Arab family living near by. Could that be the reason, or was it theft or a promise broken. Ali was a friend to everyone.
Everyone showed up for the funeral at a Mosque on the other side of the city. It was nice, the burial was really an experience, lowering Ali into the ground and the prayers so for Jimmy, different as funerals go. What a way to learn and experience another spiritual practice. Three shots, a young life, what now? Jimmy took the bus home, a strange sense of quietness over took him. He had learned something about life today, death has a lesson for all of us. Three shots, silence broken, life taken, & life continues…Ali
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