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Here is the text version
I hope that you enjoyed this poem!
We could end a war
*This is meant to be a spoken-word poem! I will try to record a spoken version soon!!
Spoiler
If every person dropped their gun.
In five seconds, we could create a safe country.
Instead of shooting, we could turn to each other
And share who we love, what we want, and who we fight for.
Our children, our husbands, our wives,
Those who have been killed, those who are injured,
And those who we have hurt with our own hands.
Maybe if you knew who I was fighting for,
You would understand my hatred.
You could see my pride, my worth, my weakness,
My longings, my mistakes, and my desires.
In my heart, I feel that control is safety,
At the cost of the lives of innocent children,
I am willing to protect my own.
I realize that you feel the same way.
Let’s take a minute and get to know each other,
Let’s sing instead of shoot.
Let’s embrace instead of kill.
Let’s forgive instead of hate those who are different.
My prejudice runs in my blood,
The same blood of my father who you killed,
But I will make the choice to stop,
To choose safety for our future.
If we both put down our guns,
We could stop a war in five seconds,
And end a battle before it starts.
About the poem: As many of you know, I am currently living in Southern Africa in the beautiful country of Zambia. Very close to us, even just past the border, in the DRC, the second largest internally displaced people's crisis is occurring, with over 25 million people (13 million children) being insecure. I will not go into details, but this has to do with fighting between government and rebel groups, along with many horrific crimes occurring. It can be hard to not be able to do anything, but sometimes all you can do is write poems and live your life in a way that promotes peace, healing, and forgiveness. I belive that peace is the solution to every war and being able to express that in poetry is refreshing to me.
Ellie, I seriously admire this piece!
I feel a strong sense of rage and desperation throughout it that I think really brings out the imperativeness of your words. I really liked your use of repetition, with your last few lines echoing the first couple and the repeated "Let's..." lines emphasizing your calls to action. I also really liked how you used juxtaposition in those lines (sing vs shoot) (embrace vs kill) (forgive vs hate), I think this is a really powerful rhetorical technique and really drives home your point that there is another option from violence. I like how you empathizes and acknowledged that there are similar motivations (to protect) on either sides of a conflict, I think I would have liked if you had built on this concept more to really emphasize that we people are really more similar than different, but overall this is very strong and poignant piece. Great job and thanks so much for sharing this!
This is a very helpful and encouraging review! Thank you, friend
Ellie <333
I would love to hear this out loud. <3
(I'd like to come back and review this later, if you give me a nudge, but for now just wanted to drop a line to say this is beautiful.)
Thank you, Que! I will try to record it once I am not sick and get my voice back XD I really appreciate the kind comment and encouragement!!
Hi, this is my first review in a long time, so i'm sorry if it's not super in depth!
I love poetry and I have a big interest in politics and I often find that politics can be such a touching topic to make great poetry. Poetry that really makes a point. Your poem really made a solid point, and you can feel the emotional history attached to it. It delivers this poignant reflection on how war is a cycle. The language is quite simple, but I think that makes it more evocative and accessible to the masses who may not always understand political references to something specific and so you've masterfully chosen the perfect language to make your point.
The part that stood out the most for me was:
it's just such a big, powerful image, that you would be willing to set aside the vengeance you may feel for the sake of all others. It's a chilling line!
I wonder if some experimentation with the layout and form might make it even more so impactful? Maybe just separating out the last line so show it's the end of a cycle of war, or something. Obviously, it's just personal preference and doesn't take away from the poem!
<3 hopefully that was not a totally useless review!!
I love what you said! Thanks so much for this wonderful review