Thirtieth Letter: Sorry

Dear Mr. Prime Minister, and all those it may concern,

I have no idea if anyone actually reads the letters sent to this office. Especially in this time of COVID-19. I’ve sent you 29 already; this is number 30. So far I’ve gotten two responses, and they were to the first two. Perhaps you’re staff have gotten tired of my letters, or perhaps COVID has something to do with it. This letter may never arrive in your hand but I hope it will at least be read by a member of your staff, or a few people on my website where I post all my weekly letters to you. If you’ve read some of my other letters you’ll know that every tenth I send a poem. The poems are always by me and always about climate change. This poem is called ‘Sorry’, and it is written in a the style of children’s poems. But this isn’t for children, this is for world leaders.

Sorry: By Amelia Penney-Crocker, Written the 24th of June 2020.

If you could travel to the future

What would you say?

Maybe you wouldn’t speak at all,

Just listen all day.

Perhaps you’d ask questions.

World peace? Financial growth?

Maybe you’d just want to know

How they’re styling their clothes.

Maybe you would talk

About what’s going on now;

Make sure they don’t forget

How all this went down.

We’re learning lessons

As a world every day;

Maybe you’d remind them

So they don’t go astray.

The future holds promise

Like a road not yet paved.

So does your trip there

If you take it one day.

But there’s one thing

You won’t want to say.

One thing no one wants to do

On that fateful day.

If you travel to the future

What will you say?

Don’t let it be the word:

Sorry

I hope you liked that poem and the other two I’ve sent you. I hope that you understand my message and really think about what it would be like to have to confront a person living in the future, and say Sorry. Sorry I let you down, Sorry I failed to protect your life. When you stand for climate justice, real climate justice not just lip-service, you’re saying that the people in the future, your children and grandchildren, matter. You are refusing to say Sorry to the future.

I hope you have a wonderful day,

Amelia Penney-Crocker