I & We

• Clare Taylor, Grade 11
• Poetry
• 2016

I remember being told once that
“every generation thinks it’s special”;
sarcasm and contempt creeping where I knew
they had no root, no right, no truth in being there.

this blindness to the miracle and to the marvel
of evolution and progress and time was astounding.
to me, to think that someone could believe that we mere mortals
were simple carbon copies of bloodlines, nothing more than repeats
on nature’s looping record-player is far beyond insulting.
my grandfather watched our land’s first people become citizens,
his grandmother fought oceans to find hope from poverty,
my grandchildren may see worlds beyond our sun and shores.

each era is blessed with the lessons of the past;
our DNA acts as our yellow brick road.
though history’s taught us to remember,
We all know our fates lie off the path.