Fake News – A Poem

I hope you’ve had a great week! As a few of you may have noticed, I have spent the last few weeks/months giving a lot more attention to this blog and posting regular content. This week I thought it might be nice to throw it back to one of my earlier posts for the benefit of anyone new around here. I actually really enjoyed sharing my poetry in this way and am cooking up some ideas of how I can creatively share my work in the future! Hope you enjoy this throwback post. As always let me know what you think and share this post with your poetry-loving friends!

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I don’t often share my poetry on social media, especially not my longer pieces of spoken word. I know that there are a few video’s of me performing live out there in the ether and I occasionally share smaller pieces of poetry online too, but those sharings are usually reserved for the pieces of work I don’t know what I’d do with otherwise! Saying this, I recently performed at The SAN (Social Auditing Network) Conference, where I was tasked with listening to the talks, then creating and performing some poetry in response. I found this so interesting and really think that pressure-filled assignments like this can produce the most surprising results! So please see below, my take on Fake News – a concept that came up within the conference that sparked my interest.

Fake News

I remember when I was 5 years old
it was a frosty Christmas Eve and I was
filled with excitement and curiosity
I asked my mum how Santa
was going to fit through our tiny chimney
Without even blinking she replied
“He’s got a magic key
he’ll open up the front door
and put your presents under the tree”
I remember when I was 13
my mum cut out the pages of a teen magazine
so that I would not read the article about rape

I’m not saying that what my mum did was bad
from a place of protection and love
my mum did what she could to keep me young
didn’t deny me of the facts
just simply waited till I was old enough

But from as early as I can remember
the truth around us has been twisted to fit an agenda
not necessarily in the name of peace or safety
but in the name of fulfilling someone else’s
unbalanced need

These days, news stories are resembling
whispers on the playground
because truth is a word full of puncture wounds
and is rapidly deflating
Truth has led us down a path with little more than
breadcrumbs in our pockets
Truth is a friend who neglects to text, then posts on Facebook
but says their phone was “broken for a bit”
The truth here is grown inside a petri dish
fed artificial food,
never sees the natural light of day,
instead lives under phosphorescent

I dream of a future where truth is sacred
and never watered down or tampered with

But in a world where truth holds a very hollow meaning
it might be wise to look inside
and see what fake news of our own
we may be perpetuating
I aspire to be a pillar of honesty
but I weave poems out of stories for a living,
turn pain into paper stars
and I sprinkle art all over everything
I would never be able to do that
without a touch of creative licensing

I’m not saying this makes me just as bad
or that we should tell our kids the real reason
why Santa can’t fit through the chimney,
I’m just saying that it’s important to recognise
that even white lies can contribute
to the problem we are having
You are instrumental in the fight for truth
But first, look in the mirror and be honest
because fake news starts with you

Lyndsay Price

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I hope you’ve enjoyed giving my poem a read! Be sure to check out my goodbye letter last week on ending my poetry night! Stay tuned because in the upcoming weeks I will be sharing; my experience with The Life Changing Magic of Tidying, the reasons why I switched from writing poetry to blogging, the usual monthly wrap-ups and some guest posts from people from all walks of life, living creatively in their own right! Don’t forget to say hi on social media. (Especially since my Instagram is so new and I also have in my humble opinion, the best Pinterest account ever.) Until then!

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