The poem below was chosen as the winner in the Senior category of JCG’s annual House Poetry competition where we encourage pupils across the school to submit their best work.
I believe this poem displays the extent of the talent held by students at JCG for a multitude of reasons. Having studied English at A level, I immediately recognise the extended metaphor of ‘the museum of myself’, which I understand is a clever reference to the comparison of the present and the past. Whether this poem is anecdotal or simply one of imagination, it evokes feelings of nostalgia and the sense of longing for when life was more manageable and stress-free in childhood. The punctuation is of a high standard, with frequent hyphenation suggesting lingering thoughts and hesitation. I am particularly impressed by the line ‘ambition tightening the air,’ as this use of clever imagery demonstrates the skills students learn from early on in the school and which equip them for use in GCSE and even A level English.
Though the poem has depressing undertones at first glance, readers may quickly come to realise it is a poem of hope and the final line ‘outside the world stretched wide’ carries connotations of optimism for the next steps of the speaker’s life. Overall, I believe this poet is well deserved as the Senior Winner and should be credited for her lexical choices and talent for creative poetry.
Museum of Myself
Senior Winner – Viktoria (Year 11)
I step into the museum of myself
Where childhood dreams hang from the ceiling –
Stripped of their colour,
Yet still humming with joy.
Their shadows shift as I move,
Hesitating.
The corridor narrows,
Expectations press closer,
Ambition tightening the air.
A mannequin wears a future I never chose –
Its shoulders too broad for mine.
I linger, noting the blank plaque beside it.
At the end, a room opens,
Alive with whispers of nostalgia:
The floor sticky with glitter,
Muddy wellies lying scattered by the door,
Crayon scribbles across old drawings,
Rosy cheeks smiling up from every photograph.
I step carefully through the echoes of laughter,
Tracing the ghosts of joy I had almost forgotten,
Reclaiming the dreams that will stitch together the life I always dreamed of.
I leave the museum relieved.
The doors click behind me,
And outside the world stretches wide.