I Have a Dream: Inaugural Poems for a New Generation

SYDNEY MCGUIRK Tense and Time Today is today, Tomorrow is tomorrow, We are in the present, Not the past or future, Let us not look back but forward, Learn from the past as they say, Accept your losses and go home, Peel off the helmet, Say congratulations, And return home putting on a mask to protect yourself from the past, Not us, Not today, We embrace and do not hide, We look to the past to honor those before us, The men and women, With sweat beaded bodies, Strength like my fathers, And calloused hands, Scared with memories, Storybooks, They all tell stories of the past, Where you come from, Who you are, It might be critical but it does not define you, You are what makes this wheel turn, The decisions made, They define us, This is our decision for the future, What happens now defines it, We are often asked who you are, To that the answer is I don’t know, We will never truly know who we are for our story is never ending, Instead stand for something, Shout scream Walk run And all of the above Never stop telling your story, 81