Reflection

I am an artist and a writer. I'm in a creative writing class at my school, and we were given some optional prompts to work off of if we want some ideas for things to write about. Now, I was originally going to work on my novel idea, but one of the prompts — "at the end of an empty street" — sparked some poetry inspiration in me. I've had an idea of something to write in the back end of the factory in my mind, writing about the new section of land being decimated and built on by my neighborhood, basically shooing out the natural wooden habitat to bunnies, coyotes, and deer. The beautiful forest and hilly fields that were once there are now more cookie-cutter houses. I feel like this poem of mine can connect to the idea of a concrete jungle. When my neighborhood bought the plot of what used to be farmland and forest, it erased most of the greenery I used to love as a kid from my neighborhood. Now, I only have a small bit of county-protected greenery behind my house. It felt unnecessary to expand our neighborhood other than a money grab, at the cost of the beautiful ecosystems. The native animals had to find new homes further away. It really allows me to reminisce about the beauty the earth used to have in my home, and appreciate the small patches my neighborhood kept. My message to people reading the poem is to appreciate the Earth's beauty before it is gone.