We are Virginia Tech

In case you missed her passionate rendition of this poem at a convocation today, here is the text composed by Nikki Giovanni:

We Are Virginia Tech
We are Virginia Tech
We are sad today
And we will be sad for quite a while.
We are not moving on
We are embracing our mourning.
We are Virginia Tech
We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly
We are brave enough to bend to cry ...
And sad enough to know we must laugh again.
We are Virginia Tech
We do not understand this tragedy.
We know we did nothing to deserve it.
But neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS.
Neither do the invisible children

walking the night away

to avoid being captured by a rogue army.
Neither does the baby elephant

watching his community being devastated for ivory.
Neither does the Mexican child

looking for fresh water.
Neither does the Appalachian infant

killed in the middle of night in his crib

in the home its father built with his own hands

being run over by a boulder

because the land was destablized.
No one deserves a tragedy.
We are Virginia Tech.
The Hokie nation embraces our own and

reaches out with open heart and hands

to those who offer their hearts and minds.
We are strong and brave and innocent and unafraid.
We are better than we think and

not quite what we want to be.
We are alive to the imagination and the possibility.
We will continue to invent the future.
Through our blood and tears
Through all this sadness
We are the Hokies.
We will prevail
We will prevail
We will prevail
We are Virginia Tech.

-- Nikki Giovanni, University Distinguished Professor of English, VTI&SU

Pastor Linda

The Rev. Linda McCloud

Founding Pastor

The Episcopal Church of Our Savior at Honey Creek

www.oursaviorhoneycreek.org

http://oursaviorhoneycreek.blogspot.com