A June Memorial for New Orleans, Orlando and Colorado Springs - 3. Part III: Colorado Springs, and The Closing Prayer

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Part III: Colorado Springs

The Club Q Attack, 2022 ^[8]

(After the Tenor has gone back to their seat, the Cantor returns to the pulpit or podium, and recites the following.)

Recitation 5: Account of the Club Q attack

CANTOR:

City of Colorado Springs,

The night of November nineteenth,

Two thousand twenty-two, someone

Plotted and schemed for weeks and months

To kill as many Queer people

As was humanly possible.

Assault rifle, and a handgun

Standing by, Club Q was entered.

No warning given, shots rang out.

A mother shielding her daughter

Received a gunshot in the face;

The friendly bartender who’d served

The murderer that very night –

When come to check out the crowd size –

Was targeted especially.

The criminal had sketched layouts

Of the club to know precisely

Where people would shelter under

As assassin’s attack, so they’d

All get mown down specifically.

The murderer’s phone was live-streamed

Onto a site dedicated

To showing how mass murder’s done.

(The Cantor closes their book and returns to their seat while the Bass/Baritone stands and moves to the central part of the performing area. A guitarist joins the Bass/Baritone, and together with the other musicians, accompanies the singer in the following Psalm.)

No. 6: Psalm 30, B

BASS/BARITONE:

Once, when I felt safe,

I could cry out to heaven:

“I’m invincible!”

For when you, O Lord, granted

Your good will and strength,

I was filled with majesty.

But when you hid your face,

You filled me, Lord, with terror.

(Instrumental recap/solo and bridge)

To your reason, I plead, God,

“What good does my bleeding-out show

If it but sinks down in my grave?

Would the soil then give you your praise,

Or proclaim righteous fulfillment?”

For when you, O Lord, granted

Your good will and strength,

I was filled with majesty.

But when you hid your face,

You filled me, Lord, with terror.

(Instrumental recap/solo and closing)

Hear me plead for your mercy, God.

Hear me and be my comforter.

(Once complete, the guitarist returns to their seat while the soloist remains in place. The Cantor returns to the pulpit or podium to recite the following.)

Recitation 6: Aftermath of the Club Q attack

CANTOR:

Five were killed on that chilly night,

And more than a dozen others

Suffered gunshot wounds, however,

Further bloodshed was averted

When Tom James, naval officer,

Grabbed the barrel of the rifle,

Wrestling the murderer down

To the floor to stop the assault.

Even after the killer pulled

His handgun and shot James two times,

In the abdomen, the hero

Would not halt, saving many lives.

Army vet Richard Fierro

Joined James in pinning the killer

To the floor until police came.

Weeks later, district attorneys

Still debated publicly if

Charges of hate crime should be filed,

Once again daring to question

What the victims had done

To ‘deserve’ the sentence they got.

(After a few silent moments, the Cantor closes their book and returns to their seat. Then, Reader 3 stands, goes to the pulpit or podium to deliver the following Skyscraper, which includes reading out the title.)

READER 3:

A Colorado Springs Skyscraper

How is it

We’re the ones expected

To turn the other cheek, to forget,

And instantly forgive those who would murder us

For nothing more than the simple fact

We’re expected to be

The weak ones.

At moon-rise

When the night-blooming scents

Emerge from their diurnal hiding

Are we expected not to remember our dead,

When June comes – this sweetest time of year –

Killed just for who they loved

And shielded?

What answers

Are ever to be found

When the crimes’ perpetrating people

Would rather have their victims look the other way,

Sowing divisive, homophobic

Contentions among us

To divert.

But the night,

Hurt when these deaths occur,

Is able to wash away hard thoughts

With jasmine, and trumpet flower, and the sweet smells

God gave as signs of the eternal,

And asks our hearts gently

To forgive.

(Reader 3 closes their book and returns to their seat. The Choir prepares to accompany the soloist in the following lullaby.)

No. 7: “Ar hyd y nos” performed with these lyrics ^[9]

CHOIR:

(As an introduction, the Choir hums the entire Verse 1 section, up to but not including, the second refrain.)

BASS/BARITONE:

[Verse 1]

Never forget

The unchanging fact:

Love is love.

Through our upset,

Though we’re attacked,

Love is love.

Knowing we’ll never fully comprehend,

We ask wond’ring when it’s meant to end.

BASS/BARITONE and CHOIR:

(in unison)

Never forget

The unchanging fact:

Love is love.

BASS/BARITONE with CHOIR:

(Choir humming)

[Verse 2]

Never forget

The unchanging fact:

Love is love.

Through our upset,

Though we’re attacked,

Love is love.

(Choir sings “Ah” for verse that follows)

There can be but one true suggestion

For when we struggle with the question –

(Choir returns to humming for the refrain)

We ask wond’ring when it’s meant to end.

Through our upset,

Though we’re attacked,

Love is love.

(Instrumental recap/sole and bridge)

BASS/BARITONE:

Never forget

The unchanging fact:

Love is love.

Through our upset,

Though we’re attacked,

Love is love.

The Closing Prayer:

(Once the lullaby is complete, the guitarist rejoins the other musicians, the Soprano and Tenor join the Bass/Baritone, and the Cantor moves to the center of the performing area. The three Readers will join the Cantor, and the musical director will lead Choir, musicians and soloists in performing Psalm 129 [130] after its introduction by the Cantor.)

Recitation 7: Closing

CANTOR:

We have marked here tonight just three

Of the many attacks on us

As individuals, and as

A Community bound in strength.

As we begin our closing prayer,

I ask each of us to recall

People we’ve known who have suffered

Violence just because they are

Who they’ve always been meant to be.

With these people acknowledged here,

We’ll offer up our closing prayer

And conclude this memorial.

No. 8: “de profundis” by Johann Georg Reutter, performed with the following lyrics in English translation ^[10]

CHOIR and SOLOISTS:

From the deepest depths I call to you, my dear Lord;

My dear Lord; please hear how my voice cries out.

Permit your dear hearing to be most receptive

To the sound of mournful prayer coming from me.

Yet, when you mark the wickedness of others,

My dear Lord; my dear Lord; how shall any thrive?

Because with you there’s alleviation for all,

And because of your fairness, I may thrive, my dear Lord.

My soul’s standing firm in the righteous words his lips have uttered:

My soul’s firm in the righteous words spoken by the Lord God.

As sentinels keeping watch in the night, right through to the dawn,

Shall God’s people find hope in the Lord God.

Because with my dear Lord there lives forgiveness

And copious is his abundant redemption.

Thus, he’ll absolve all his people

From each of their wrongdoings with his mercy.

SOLOISTS:

Glory be the Father, and the Son,

And the most Holy Spirit.

As it was in the beginning,

It’s now and always,

World unchanging, and eternal.

Amen.

CHOIR and SOLOISTS:

Amen, amen, amen, amen, amen.

~