In Scott Westerfeld's Extras, each person has their own news feed. But with so many feeds, not everyone will get noticed. Even in today's world, anyone can have a blog, a Facebook page. It can be easy to feel lost in the crowd, unnoticed, merely an extra. Even before blogs, when I was first writing poetry in high school and trying to get published, I penned this poem about wanting to be heard:
My Letter to the World
What do I have to say to the world
That all but deserted me?
Would anyone listen to a single soul
Through the unheard art of poetry?
Although surrounded by others,
Wanting my voice to be heard,
I’m often isolated
For no one will hear my words.
Can I make a difference in someone’s life,
As others did in mine?
Will anyone read the simple words
That I wrote in my spare time?
I may be a shy, quiet person
But I have a message of my own;
Won’t someone come and discover
The soul within my poems.
Once I had the word Extra stuck in my head while planning this post, there's one other thing that kept coming to mind. "Extra! Extra! Read all about it." More news trying to get attention, the newsies selling their papers on the streets. So here's my new poem on topic:
Extra Extra!
sellin' news
on the streets
tryin' to stand out in the crowd
to be heard o'er the noise
weighin' the need for food,
a roof overhead,
against standin' up
for what's right
just one boy, one voice,
the big man won't hear,
but one becomes legion--
united we change the world
If you haven't seen it, the movie Newsies follows these boys, in their struggle to stand up to the presses. And since Newsies is a musical, I simply must include a song.
P.S. If you haven't yet read Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series, check it out. Awesome YA dystopian series. My husband and I bought the whole set after being unable to put down the sample chapters. So compelling.
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