Yeah, I Dream

So, this is a poem I wrote for school, but it took on a life of its own. It's about my dream for the world, for America (I spend enough time there to almost call it home. Lived there for a year; go every summer holiday.), and for myself.

Anyway, here it is. Tear it apart:
_____________________________________________




Open your ears
Under the scream of urban metal
The cries of starving children
The stinking filth that covers the world
Someone is dreaming.
Yeah, it’s me.
And somewhere in my restless sleep, I dream of the divine.
A world that bears no prejudice, no
Anti-Semitic preachers screaming
“Vermin! Vermin! God will damn you all!”
No little girls walking to school in their hijab
And being called terroristbombsbombsyoukilledmyuncle.
No more women who have to cover their face
Told they’re not worth anything that they’re dirtfilthhideyourself.
No more.

Yeah, they say a dream’s just a wish.
But I think dreams are your soul saying
“Please, please.” And your mind saying
“Let us be free.”
So I dream, and I dream, and I wish
That God will bless America,
Or at least give everybody freedom.
I dream that one day
That girl with short hair can walk down the hallways of her smalltown school
And nobody will yell
“Dyke, you stupid dyke, you’re gay, you’re dead.”
They don’t even know the truth…
And for once nobody will push by her
Or torture her with not-so-false accusations.
And none of those perfect, good little boys will touch her just to watch her cry.
I dream that one day
That man who lives down the street
The one who you only ever see in green
The one whose boyfriend cries when he goes off on that lonely plane
To fight for the people, to die for the people
Who tell him he’s not man enough to serve
Will finally have someone step up to him and say
“Thank you.”
Will finally get to be called ‘soldier’.
And I dream that one day
When those two girls from Louisiana
Who get starry eyed when they look at each other
Can get married in their own backyard
With little sweet white roses and warm Louisiana sun on their skin
And a legal certificate that smells like parchment and freedom.

Yeah, most wishes don’t come true.
And sometimes, you feel so soulless and empty you just want to scream.
And I know that after every good dream, you wake up.
But I dream for myself, once in a while.
I dream that one day, I can walk back into my old smalltown school
And I can walk up to that perfect, good little boy
The one who kicked me and scorned me
And I would look him eye to eye, no more tears
And tell him
“I’m gay.”

Spoiler

BACKGROUND:
Just so you all know where I'm coming from, I lived in America for a year when I was eleven and my dad's work re-located there. My dad works all over, and travels a lot, and we ended up re-relocating back to the UK. However, I still end up getting taken with my dad to America very often, and we spend our Summer holidays there. I thought you might be wondering why I'm always blabbering about the States when I'm not from there I must say, my small taste of the American school system was not a pleasant one, and my middle schooling here in England wasn't that amazing either. A lot of very ignorant people liked to say ignorant things. And yeah, for some reason, both American and English boys are terrible. They would call me names, try to touch me to upset me, trip me... fun things. And they thought I was straight, too! They just liked to call me gay to upset me. They also loved to hate on Muslims and Jews... it was awful. Fortunately that ended by the time I got to an International Baccalaureate High School.

I really like this. I feel like it's a song more than a poem, but I'm not a great composer or anything, so I don't undertake to put music to it.

Anywho.

You have some lovely lines and great imagery in here. Now, I realize this was largely inspired by the treatment you received at the hands of some very cruel boys, and that's why so much of it is focused on gay/lesbian rights, but I think you go a little overboard on it - not by what you're saying, but just the fact that, you know, you start off with the issues more of racism and unequal treatment of women and then shift focus entirely on gay rights. I just feel like the various rights being dealt with need to be tied in together a little more, or like you should maybe not talk for so long about gay rights, because it sort of whacks the poem out of balance when you spend so much more time on gay rights than on the other issues. Or you could shift it so the whole poem is about gay rights, and leave the other issues for other poems. But that's really my only complaint, that the pieces of the poem don't quite fit together nicely.

Other than that, this is really good, I love the imagery and the message.

Hope this helped!

~Blue

Thanks very much! Yeah, the assignment was to start on a dream for the world and then cale it down i. The poem to a dream for yourself. I think I'll rewrite it sometime just focusing on the specific rights.

Thanks again!