All of the poems that I was asked to read I notice they all have something in common. Besides being poems they seem to all be from the perspective of a witness to the account of what is happening to the person in the poem. I realize that Sam Hamill says that poets can write from many different perspectives. Like from the perspective of the victim, witness, or the perpetrator. To me it seems like these poems are all from the angle of, someone who was there, a silent witness. Much of Sam Hamill's poem speaks on both ends of the spectrum. Sometimes from the victims stand point and sometimes from the perpetrators' stand point.
He does go on to say that he was a victim in his poem and how helpless he felt while being victimized. He stated that he was not found till the next day by the guards and how still today this bothers him. It was so brutal what was done to him at 14 years old that he will never forget it. I wish we lived in a perfect world and these things did not happen to people, but the world we live in is not perfect. Yes, many times we turn our backs to the hard to perceive ugly truth about war, or rape, or murder, or child abuse. I believe we do this so that we do not have to deal with it. There are many things in life that are hard to deal with, but they must be dealt with.
Our society has become so desensitized to so many things that we just see a lot of things as a fact of life, when in reality we should be sensitive about it. Not accept it as it is morally wrong and should not be tolerated. Like teenage pregnancy and abortion, we all know that birth control pills and other contraceptives have been around for many years. They are advertized on television, the radio, the internet. We are not a caveman society we are an informed society. We just choose to take the, "I did not know", way out. This is pure ignorance on us as an educated people. In high school now they have programs were the student is given a life like baby to take home. This baby doll cries like a baby unexpectedly and can not always be appeased. This gives a young person just a glimpse of what it would be like to have a baby to care for. Believe me it is not all roses raising a family is hard work and never stops even when your children grow up.
Speech is a very important part of our society today. The freedom of speech that we have in the United States should not be taken for granted, though we do. There are many other countries that people can not speak freely in for fear of death even if they do. I am blessed to be living in the United States that still allows freedom of speech.
By Dorothy Kee
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