“It is curious how sometimes the memory of a death lingers so much longer than the life it has purloined.” – Arundhati Roy (The God of Small Things).

Last week, a colleague posted on Facebook that another young man in his community was shot in the head.

On Tuesday, he wrote that he was dead.

And my first response was to want to “like” the status update… I got a hold of myself before doing that. There is something about these death announcements that has become rote, quotidian. Our ritual is to hear the news, offer our condolences, and get on with the day. We can’t absorb the magnitude of the losses. We know that the next one is around the corner; the next death is always around the corner. If we allow ourselves to feel… everything, we might stop breathing. It feels that heavy, that overwhelming. At least it does to me.

So I was grateful this weekend to my friends at Occupy Rogers Park and the Chicago Overpass Light Brigade for organizing a peace march & memorial in my community. The weather was miserable: cold and rainy. But a couple dozen people braved the elements to commemorate those we lost to homicide this year and to stand with the living against further criminalization (which is itself a form of violence).

photo by Gretchen Hasse (12/21/13)

photo by Gretchen Hasse (12/21/13)

We must bear witness. We have to acknowledge that every life is precious and sacred. We must reclaim our ability to grieve for strangers. It’s part of what makes us human.

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (12/21/13)

As we marched and sang, people stopped to ask what we were doing. Others honked their car horns and waved to us from their apartment windows. I think that these were expressions of curiosity, gratitude, and relief. Yes relief because people desperately want to believe that we can and do still care for and about each other. Memorializing is an important part of healing.

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (12/21/13)

As we stood vigil, there were at least three police cars keeping watch. The irony was not lost on any of us. We are trying to imagine peace in the shadow of the police state. It was a good reminder of the challenge that we face and stiffened our spines for the ongoing struggle against all forms of violence (structural & interpersonal).

photo by Gretchen Hasse (12/21/13)

On Saturday evening, in a neighborhood called Rogers Park, in a city called Chicago, people stood together as a rebuke to the idea that the lives lost this year are expendable. We stood together and we imagined peace.

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (12/21/13)