NEW WILMINGTON, Pa. – A Westminster College professor’s poem written in the days following the Aug. 3 El Paso shooting was recently published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette newspaper.

“Breakfast on Our Patio after the Mass Shooting in El Paso,” penned by Dr. David Swerdlow, professor of English, responds to the mass shooting in Texas that claimed the lives of 22 people and injured 24 others.

In his poem, Swerdlow—whose wife of 29 years immigrated to the United States from the South American country of Peru in 1990—shares his fears following the shooting that is believed to be the deadliest attack against Latinos in the U.S. in recent history.

“I started writing it a few days after the shooting. Some poems come quickly. This was one of them,” Swerdlow said. Because of the poem’s subject matter and timeliness, Swerdlow submitted his poem to the Post-Gazette for publication consideration.

The piece appeared in the “Insight” section of the Post-Gazette’s Aug. 18 edition.

Swerdlow, who joined the Westminster College faculty in 1990, earned his undergraduate from the University of Maryland and his master’s and Ph.D. from Ohio University. He specializes in creative writing, modern and contemporary American literature and postcolonial literature.  He is the author of two books of poetry and his work has appeared in The American Poetry Review, Poetry, West Branch, The Denver Quarterly and others.

Swerdlow also recently completed a novel about a school shooting. “Television Man" is slated for release this fall by Czykmate Productions.

To read Swerdlow’s poem, click here.

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