BRATTLEBORO — As we went to press Tuesday, we learned that a student at Brattleboro Union High School died Monday morning by her own hand.
We struggle to comprehend the pain of Leah Short, a sophomore from Dummerston. We struggle to grasp the shock and the sorrow that her family and friends are enduring.
In a small community, when someone dies so tragically, the loss touches us all. In an area like Brattleboro and Windham County, nobody is a total stranger. It is impossible for something like this to happen and not affect any of us at least by association.
In a photo of Leah taken during a soccer game this fall, she has assumed control of the the ball and, as she dribbles it gracefully, looks straight into the camera lens.
It is haunting, after the fact, to look at this image and see nothing other than a beautiful, seemingly confident young woman who should have been looking forward to a full and limitless life.
The camera just can't fully capture the pain of adolescence.
Sometimes with such tragedies, we struggle for logic and for clues. We struggle to comprehend, yet we find only more questions for which there simply aren't any answers.
But whatever the reason or reasons Leah left this universe, no explanation will lessen the pain for those whose hearts are broken by this sudden loss of a young life, the loss of one of our own in this community.
In 2009, Leah, then an eighth grader in the Dummerston Elementary School, submitted a poem, “Through the Window,” to the Young Writers Project, a Burlington-based nonprofit that encourages student writing.
“Through the window/My mind can wander/I want to just go/Not sit here and ponder,” she wrote. “But where would I go?/My bare feet would lead me/I would just know/That I will be free.”
May Leah Short's family and friends, and the entire BUHS school community, find comfort and solace in their grief during the difficult weeks and months ahead.