by Britney Nguyen

If only they knew what they were doing to their home

With their litterings destroying our biomes

For when we have no more air to breathe

That’s when they know they must seize

But by then it would be too late

And discover that they could’ve changed the fate

When the air becomes as dark as tar

To our own Earth we have left a scar

And when the seas cry out, filled with our rummage

There will be no time to go pack our luggage

We will stay the same if we go to Mars,

But if we damage it like we did to Earth, could we really call it ours?

Poetry Publication Reflection

1. The type of poem I published was an “Inspired By” Poem.

2. My source of inspiration was an issue, which was pollution, because pollution has something to do with the whole world which I wanted to reach out to.

3. The tone of my poem is despair (keywords: dark, scar, damage, destroying).

4. The theme of my poem is to change before it’s too late.

5. Two examples of figurative language in the poem are:

a) Quote: “When the air becomes as dark as tar,”

b) Type: Simile

c) This figurative language contributes to tone and theme development because it shows that we are polluting the air with harsh chemicals and making the air unbreathable.

a) Quote: “And when the seas cry out,”

b) Type: Personification

c) This figurative language contributes to tone and theme development because it shows how much we are damaging our waters to the point they feel the need to cry, like when we happen to cry when we are hurt.

6. Two specific ways I revised this poem are

Revision #1: I changed “And when the seas become impossible to rummage,” to “And when the seas cry out, filled with our rummage,”.

Explanation: I made this revision because I wanted to add a piece of personification, to show if the seas had feelings like we do.

Revision #2: I changed “people” to “they” in the beginning and middle of the poem.

Explanation: I made this revision because I wanted the reader to think “Who?” even though it would be obvious, but the pollution could be coming from anything and anyone, but I then revealed the word “our” towards the end to show that it was us humans who were doing the damage.

7. It was easy to write this poem because pollution is a worldwide problem and coming from my perspective, I had a lot of feelings about it so I just let my thoughts flow out into this poem.

8. I am very satisfied with my final draft because I got to project how I see the relationship between humans and Earth with pollution.