In the second unit of our Countercultures class we had to write and perform a poem about a future utopia. That was the only information given to us and the rest was up to our imagination. I wanted to create something as original as possible because I knew that everyone will likely touch on some of the same problems in the world today. Thinking about what I would like the future to look like, I just started writing, and than my writing turned into a maze of words and stanzas. It soon turned into a game the reader would have to win. I am proud that my poem turned into this because it made people think and infer. Many poems have some kind of answer, but mine leaves the answer unsolved and asks the reader to simply look and find the answer for themselves, whatever that may be. Below is a video of me reading my poem and the written poem itself.
Are You Looking?
Start,
Look at a picture of the world without hate,
The fear you feel when you see a frown,
Disappears when the corners of their lips turn up, instead of upside-down,
You smile back with light in your eyes,
Like John said,
“The love you take is equal to the love you make.”
Start looking,
A world with no guns and weapons
No crimes to commit.
Subtract some funerals
And add more dreamers.
The picture in the back of your closet
Collecting dust and getting old,
Just like the ideas of the world becoming a better place,
In your mind.
Start looking,
Stop worrying about the time today,
And start worrying about the future tomorrow,
Can the air be clean?
The cool breath crisp in your lungs as you breath,
In and out.
And the stars,
Will they shine once again?
Every single one bursting with light,
Shouting at us that they are alive.
Alive indeed is what I’d like my child to be.
The pictures in your closet of the world renewed,
They can become true,
If you start looking.
Are you looking?