John F Kennedy

Emily Kremers, age 17

He stood upon his golden pedestal,
Placed there by every man’s need for a hero.
Solid and strong in our crippling nation,
Smiling in reply to overwhelming adoration.

“Your future is as promising as your past is proud.”
Words that lingered and drew inward the hope of all Irishmen,
To be proud again.

To stand, as one, in the ashes of the broken.
To build a future from the tears in our eyes and bruises on our backs.
We would find our hope; We would hold it to our hearts,
And we would sing our freedom.

Promise gleamed in our restless eyes,
And he, he saw it.
He saw the strength that could never cease.
So I say this with respect and I say it with release;
May his prosperous soul rest in eternal peace.