In today’s society many children and even adults don’t appreciate what they have and realize it when it’s too late or when they finally open up their minds. In the spoken word poem #Dear Mum by a young Islamic man, based on his deceased mother is a beautiful poem with a lot of meaning. Losing someone extremely important who you love dearly such as a mother can be heartbreaking and life changing. That’s why you should always show how much you love them and how grateful you are to have them in your live. The poem describes love, regret, and how much the man admired his mother. This poem can relate and impact many people due to the strong message behind it. A lot of people don’t know what they have until they lose it and then regret certain actions they did or actions they could of done. As revealed in this poem, the man shows and opens up to his mother about his wrong doings and asks for forgiveness.
The man starts of with the company of beautiful music playing in the background which helps the reader feel the powerful emotions the man shows especially with the rhythm and hand movements throughout the poem. He brings his hands towards him pretty often. This shows how passionate he is and how how sentimental this is for him. He finds himself present in a kitchen by himself in front of a camera and a tea cup behind him which represents his mother’s lemonade. He states that his mother loved him at first sight and even before he was born and mentioned the 9 months many women go through when having a baby. He also mentions how she was the type of mother who would give up her slippers to him to keep him warm as well as being up in the cold hanging up his clothes and spending hours cooking. His mother showed she care about him when he mentions that she wouldn’t go to sleep when he wasn’t home and would stay up sending him texts to his phone making sure he was safe. A lot of sons and daughters can agree that their mothers do the same and this show how much mothers care for their children. You can see this gesture of love and caring from parents in our daily lives. He then proceeds by asking for forgiveness and is sorry for not telling her before. He says he’s sorry for making an “uff” gesture when having to do chores as well as not giving her the life she dreamt of. He is most importantly sorry for the pain he caused her such as fights they’ve had and the sacrifices he never recalled when he was younger. I’m sure many of us can relate to this as well and it’s something we don’t take in mind when we are younger. There are people out there that don’t have the perfect relationship with their mothers and then there’s those who do have a perfect relationship with their mothers. And even though people might find themselves in tough situations, many people might still love their mothers even though they don’t show it.
An example of something from my life that relates to the gesture he makes towards his chores is relatable to that of mine. When I was younger I would be told to do chores or to clean up my room or whatever it was I had to do, and I would find myself being upset for not wanting to do such chores but as I grew up it became something normal and not big of a deal. When we are younger we tend to do many wrong things and don’t realize them until we are older. We also might cause pain without realizing it and don’t recall or become aware of many sacrifices our mothers make.
We all love our mothers and many times people don’t appreciate what they have until it’s gone. I feel like I can relate to this poem because I feel like I love my mother as much as this man loves his. After watching this man express his feelings and emotions in his poem, it makes me appreciate my mother way more. A lot of people like me are extremely lucky to still have their mothers and I am extremely grateful and super appreciate because there’s no one else or anything else I love more than my mother as well as my family. There’s nothing wrong with telling them and show them how much you appreciate them and telling them you love them and showing them you care about them. It’s an amazing feeling and it’s also great to be able to write about this topic and being able to explore the emotions and feelings this young man has for his mother. After watching this poem, it makes you want to go up to your mother and say “I love you!” And remember you only have one.
Artist Statement Prompt (Assignment #1)
My audience for this project is everyone who has a mother because the poem #Dear Mum is about a son and his deceased mother. This can relate to anybody else though and not just a mother. It can be a father, a sister, a brother, you name it. The young man expressed his love for his mother and how much he misses her and asks for forgiveness. I want my audience to know that a lot of the time we have people in our lives that we don’t appreciate as much as we should. Why? Well because people don’t realize what they have until it’s gone pretty often. We as human beings don’t live forever even if we were to wish for it. Therefore, we should all appreciate our mothers and well everyone in our lives and should show them our love and enjoy the moments we have with them. This doesn’t apply to only family. It can also be friends and even anything such as a house, a car, food, and pretty much any other commodities that help us survive or things we need and want. There are people out there that don’t have what others have. Many people have it all and don’t appreciate it and don’t realize that it can be gone in a blink of an eye. I want my audience to learn to not take mother’s, family, and things for granted. We all should learn to appreciate what we have and be thankful, caring, and loving. I think people will learn this because even after I listened to #Dear Mum, it made me appreciate my mother even more! Perhaps children might not fully acknowledge this because they’re young but they will learn as they get older just like me and everyone else. It’s a part of growing up. Your mind opens up and take things more into consideration when you mature. I also believe that everyone learns this because I know that my father and mother have always thought me to appreciate and be grateful for what I have since I was very little. One unique perspective that I brought to my analysis that someone else might not have is my experience of me when I was younger that relates to the man when he didn’t want to do any chores. I learned as I got older how to be responsible and give a hand to my mother with the chores which became something regular on a daily basis. I’m pretty sure a lot of kids also experience this but this to me is something that I would say is very important for me. I try to help my mother as much as possible whether it’s doing chores, running some errands, helping her take care of my younger brothers and things of that nature. I learned a lot through this piece of work, but most importantly, I learned that showing our mothers how much we care and love them should be something we shouldn’t keep inside of us. We should let them know we appreciate them by taking action and expressing ourselves. I would still like to learn how we can further explore the deep messages behind a poem and the ideas behind them and be able to analyze them in depth in whichever format. My peers played a major role in my project during the class discussion by brainstorming ideas, characteristics, and features about the poem. We got so deep into the poem that we even mentioned the background of #Dear Mum which was a kitchen and discussed its significance which would of been something that I would have never have taken into consideration if I were to had just watched the poem on my own. The discussions in class were very interesting that even my thinking about poetry has changed since working on this project because poetry is more than just a piece of writing or a spoken word. It’s a piece of art with a lot of meaning behind it that can tell a story just the way the man in #Dear Mum told. If I had another week to work on my project I would try to develop up as much as I can and be very specific and detailed about it in order to construct a strong piece of writing in order to further more impact my audience and readers. I would try to add more information and try to analyze the poem and write about it it as much as I can. The last thing I want to tell my audience before they dive into my project is to have fun and enjoy my thoughts the amazing poem of a young man who loves and misses his mother.
I emailed you my previous assignments prior to this one.
I peer reviewed the work of Henrique M. and John S.