A few months or so back, a six year old girl, Jessica Lee Weinhold, of Yoncalla, Oregon was crushed to death on the family farm as she ran to give a cool drink to the operator of a tractor trailer.
To Jessica
A poem by
Gene L. Gillette
You hadn’t yet begun to sit comfortably in school
from there who knows what journeys
would await you on life’s stage.
Plans too intricate to understand six years
into your favorite bibbed overalls.
The ones that whispered farmer.
You trusted life but life had other plans.
A cool drink taken to a hired hand was happiness
to you. Your nimble legs moved as fast as your smile
as you ran with the drink toward the tractor.
Life was being an ingredient of farm life.
The tractor driver did not know
he put the tractor in reverse
and in an instant crushed and mangled
the life force from those coveralls and smile.
Little Jessica was gone from us forever.
If God has a plan it is lost on those left behind.
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You did a good job of turning this event into a beautiful tragedy.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Jessica deserves some acknowledgement of her life.
ReplyDeleteGene
Hello, my name is Elizabeth. Jessicah is my youngest sister. One of my other sisters located your poem through google. Both her and I were curious as to who you are. I don't recognize the name so I was wondering if you knew the family, if so which side? Your poem touches my heart. Thank you for writing it.
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