Rewild Humans
Brooklyn, NY
2025, Junior, Poetry & Spoken Word
I. WITHDRAWAL
Brooklyn, weeds struggling through concrete cracks.
Litter in the gutter, cars honking, ambulances wailing down dark grey streets.
I am hidden behind curtains and glass, four plaster walls in chipped blue paint.
Days unending, a tightening corset around my ribs.
II. FREEDOM
I need to go where the air isn’t chewed-up and stale,
And the sky doesn’t seem unattainable, hidden behind curtains and glass.
I need to go where the air is leafy and crisp and hits my face like pinpricks, sharp like mint—
Where the sky is right above me, splayed out in space, so close, I can breathe it in—
I run down the concrete sidewalk and ignore the noises and the smells—
Finally, I am in Prospect Park.
Lying down on the grass, I am larger than my body, spread thin over the world,
Like fallen petals from flowering trees covering every inch of ground.
My clothes are stained green from the grass. I revel in it.
The ground is still dewy from the rain. It smells like petrichor.
III. DREAMS
Can’t we have both?
The city’s big, busy glory with nature’s rightness.
I see a skyline, a silhouette of green,
No cars, only trains, buses, and ferries, sidewalks lined
With crates and crates of flowers, bees flitting over them in spring and summer,
Skyscrapers so bursting with trees and bushes, you can’t see the building underneath,
Only the occasional sun glare off of the solar panels.
I see the Statue of Liberty’s crown so covered in plant life it’s become a wreath,
And her torch is a portrait of bioluminescence.
I want the parks to be bigger and to grow wild, I want humans to grow wilder with them.
IV. WILDING
I want to see less designer clothes, and more flower crowns, less bars and more parks.
Less people that think to become an adult is to no longer play.
Being in nature is fun and exciting and frustrating and scary, if you’re allowed to feel beyond
What is easy and prepackaged.
Sitting on the sofa or at a desk under fluorescent lighting, you can’t connect with nature.
After all, what good is humanity if you cannot remember
The last time you jumped? The last time you climbed a tree?
The last time you ran in the grass when the rain was pouring down around you?
I want humans to not think of themselves as other, as outside of nature.
After all, we came from it.
Now it’s our job to return.
Reflection
Reflection
My creative process began with free writing and a scattering of the things that worried me about climate change. I was rather surprised when I kept writing about hope, because usually writing about the environment depresses me. I decided to embrace my sudden optimism by dreaming about ways to make the world better, a place I wanted to grow up to live in, and I asked myself how I could keep my city urban, but make it green, too. Through every poem I write, I learn more about myself, what I want, and the world around me. In this case, I learned about the magnificent Bosco Verticale in Milan, Italy (literally “vertical forest” in Italian), and used that for inspiration for my skyscrapers. I learned about animal crossings. And I learned that I’m not as angry at the world as I thought I was, as well as the fact that I’m not willing to give up on the city. In exploring the annual theme, I realized that I agree with the idea that the city and sustainability are not antonyms. I also agree that making our communities greener will help mental health. But my message is taking it a step further, talking about how people need to grow wilder too. We have forgotten how to play, and we have forgotten how to simply exist in nature. We need a fundamental change in society that forces us to shed our distorted behaviors: our consumerism, our obsession with always working, and our elitism as “humans” rather than animals.