What Might Have Been Poem by Jim Yerman

Every now and then an evil so horrific rises up unexpectedly
And we realize we’re not as civilized as we would like to be.

An act of senseless violence that cuts us like a knife
To remind us of both of the wickedness and the sanctity of life.

In 1963 I was 10 years old when the entire student body was brought
Into the auditorium of our school and told President Kennedy was shot.

I remember the scene so vividly because it was surreal and stupefying
For as I scanned the auditorium that day, every adult in the room was crying.

At the time I was too young to understand what they were crying for
That somehow with those gunshots our world had changed forevermore.

As I grew up I understood not only were they crying about that mortal sin
But their tears were also flowing for a world that might have been.

What would our world look like today, what wonders might have arrived
If President Kennedy wasn’t shot, if somehow he had survived?

Was he a great president? Some say yes and some say no.
One of the tragedies of his passing is that we’ll never know.

50 years after Kennedy’s death lives are lost to evil every day
And more and more of our own innocence is slowly chipped away.

With each unimaginable act of brutality we are more and more bereft
Until I’m left to wonder, do we have any innocence left?

There are many reasons for their deaths, many people we could blame
But the truth is they are gone and our world will never be the same.

That is the true tragedy of losing President Kennedy and all lives lost in vain...
We’ll never know where their lives might have gone, what wonders they may have attained.

As we remember President Kennedy and look at the world we now live in
We mourn not only the loss of a president but the loss of what might have been.