I saw the best minds of my generation,
plagued by existential threat,
forfeit their childhoods
to barter
for a dead planet.
Who loned through publicity,
and suffered slurring mediocrity
and vexation.
Dragging themselves through
the ruins of
the free love generation.
Who howled on their knees
and bared their brains
on the international stage,
challenging the patience of
the purgatoried
and the willfully disengaged.
Who drank the tainted waters
of the wealthiest nations,
who sailed entire seas
for salvation
and our homes,
our planet,
and climate refugees.
Dreams! Visions! Ecstasies!
Ten more years of rising tides,
through which we wade;
a boatload of bullshit
and political suicides.
I saw the best minds of my generation
rebel against extinction.
What generation will follow us?
Could they follow?
Could you guarantee
their existence?
—
Lola Stansbury-Jones is a young, working-class writer from North Wales. Her poetry has been featured on Headline Poetry, Literary Yard, and Eskimo Pie.
