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Last week, I wrote this post about the burial at Bear Creek Middle School, chronicling the cathartic event that begins our process of helping kids heal their social and emotional scars. We asked all 720 students in the 7th and 8th grades to write essays focusing on what's keeping them from being their best -- as students, as friends, as family members.

Since then, Joan, Ed Morris (our social worker partner) and I have been reading the nearly 700 essays that kids dropped into the casket. We felt that if the students took the time to write, we owed them the respect of reading them all, even though the papers were anonymous.

Many of the essays deal with what we'd see as standard teen problems -- being picked on, physical appearance or relationships.

But so many of the messages were heartbreaking. Poverty, bad parenting, drug use, homelessness and sexual abuse pour off those pages, reflecting the pounding that some teens must endure.

Many of the essays simmered with a sad self-awareness. "I seem cool at times but to tell you the truth I am always, always angry. I don't know why, I just feel angry."

Another student wrote (all spellings are as written): "My life has been a totaly desaster. I have been adopted at a young age. I am bearly making it in my life.... To me I feel like I am left out in this world and family. It's just a pain in my heart that I just want to release. I think God put me on this world for a test to see will I pass or not, to see can I make my life better."

For so many, the circumstances are brutal. "I put a smile on my face just to hide all the pain suffering and sorrow. Having a dad and mom in jail is hard.... It's made me hard, it's made me always have my guard up."

Some letters came in as lists of problems. One read: "Drama; being bullied; doesn't have a relationship w/ father; relationship w/ mother isn't good; suicidal thoughts; alone; doesn't feel important; wasn't told I was loved."

The feelings of loneliness and self-destructive behavior were so widespread. "I want to forget the memories of when I wanted to take my life and the pain of feeling not wanted and not loved," one child wrote. At the bottom, he or she added tombstone dates: 1998-???

I could only read essays for about 45 minutes at a time. The deeper I dove, the angrier I got. How could our society ignore these kids? How could we forget that their lives are as valuable as those of our own children? How could we as fellow Atlantans, fellow Americans, fellow humans just stand by?

Still, the students' confessions flowed. "As a child, I tried to kill myself because I wasn't wanted. I was disgusted of myself. Because my father wasn't there I cry every father's day, have anger spasms and try to kill myself constantly. I cry because I don't know what to do."

Indeed, parents are a huge issue for these teens. One girl described her mom: "She seemed to always be mad and yelled and whooped us so that made me mad getting whooped and stuff all the time for nothing. I always wondered why was she so unhappy? ... It seems my mama is at her best when I'm at my worst. She don't want to see me good."

Sexual molestation and rape appear numerous times in the essays. "My brother (older) was my best friend, really he was. I used to talk to him before I would talk to my older sister.... I was in my bed asleep and he came in my room and touched me. I was so pissed. I woke up and he ran. So he kept doing it since I wouldn't say anything to him about it and just play it off. But then I just recently told my mom a couple of weeks ago. So now I feel so distant from my brother and I don't trust him at all."

Another wrote directly to her molester of a grandfather. "Dear XXX, I'm writing this to let you know I'm very angry. You was supposed to be my granddad but the way you acted April-May when you tried to rape me and felt all over me as I asked you to stop more than once. But just know I will always be hurt and carry this inside with me." -- From your old grand-daughter.

I could go on, but you get the picture. Ed once said to me, "You know, Kev, poverty is a mother f---er." He couldn't be more accurate.

That said, if you know me, you know I'm an optimist. We knew this would be a low point -- in fact, it's designed to be. Burying the pain means the kids have to put words to the pain. We begin to rebuild from here, helping them recognize that they have gifts the world needs, that they can define themselves rather than have others or their circumstances define them.

That work starts next week. I can't wait.