It Makes Me Wonder

26 April 2012

There is nothing more exciting to a teacher than a young, inquisitive mind. It is insatiable for knowledge, ever-questioning, soaking everything up that the classroom experience has to offer. From time to time, students produce creative works that are self-reflective of this acquisition process, of the excited gathering of information. Katie McLean, now in St Andrew's Senior College, produced a philosophical piece of prose last year, titled It Makes Me Wonder. A Middle School student at the time, her poem encapsulates the need to understand that is sparked in so many students as they begin secondary school. First published in the Middle School newsletter, we are excited to share it with you here.

What if the world wasn’t really round,

And the moon was never found?

Would we fear the crushing fall,

Or even know of it at all?
 
What if yin was actually yang,

And that love, no great pang?

Could we still live with ourselves,

All emotion off the shelves?
 
What if happy equalled sad,

And the sufferers weren’t all mad?

Would we accept it our darkness,

And grace all them heartless?
 
What if sweet was weirdly sour,

Would life’s lemons then empower?

Could we swap dinner for dessert,

And our waistbands stay unhurt?
 
What if society had it wrong,

Does your beauty make you strong?

Would you dare to be unique,

And accept the dumped critique?
 
What if we understood all the pain,

Would it stop that death in vain?

Could we find a cure in reach,

And apply it, maybe teach?
 
What if amazing had no opposite,

Would all laughter be so passionate?

Could we accept the scars on others,

And love regardless of their covers?
 
What if Death had no friends,

Would the living want an end?

Could we escape the task of life,

Or is that just too much strife?
 
What if 2012 was the end,

Would you make a last amend?

Could you live happy today,

Knowing its limit and final days?
 
What if the sun forgot to rise,

Would the darkness scale the size?

Could we find an explanation,

Was it God or fate or bacon?
 
What if opposites didn’t attract,

Would science still prove this fact?

Could we carry on today,

With no theory, no Milky Way?
 
What if fiction was assumed fact,

Would truth become myth, compact?

Could we accept what we plainly see,

Without an official guarantee?
 
What if the world could just be honest,

Would we know to be modest?

We could ask, we could ponder,

Why does it all just make me wonder?