Stone Soup Magazine for young readers, writers, and artists

Anya Geist, 13Worcester, MA Perspective Anya Geist, 13 Life is but a glass of water Half-empty, half-full We squint at it, jaws jutted Trying to see which half it is We look at it from one way And all we see is darkness Empty schools, dusty and abandoned The phantom footsteps of laughing children Haunting the halls We see empty grocery stores Looking ripped apart, torn into pieces Without the comforting din of shoppers Without shelves stocked with delicious food And we see helplessness The world wobbling severely on its axis Close to tumbling from its precious perch As the economy dives down As business stops in its tracks As life ceases to be as full as it once was But when we blink and move our head Letting a new angle seep in We see light and joy We see spring, flowers blossoming Birds chirp merrily, their songs amplified Sweeter because of the lack of cars We see the outdoors We smell fresh, clean air Feel the warm sun on our faces So different from the stifling lights at school And we see community Not in person, perhaps But reaching out across the globe As people unite with friends and family Bringing themselves closer together Waving a common banner against COVID-19 And so, you see When you stare at the glass of life You have options, choices The way the world appears The scenes you see outside your door All depend on the way you look This picture, of a tree in my front yard, illustrates my poem. Half of the image is on a cloudy day and half is on a sunny day, representing our ability to choose which to see.