Look Up!

Congratulations to Lyra Simpson (NSW), winner of the Poetry category of the Hachette Australia Prize for Young Writers in 2024! Read Lyra’s winning piece below.

Lyra Simpson (she/her) is a writer living on Cammeraygal land. She loves writing about finding hope in the natural world and reading murder mysteries.

Look Up!

Look up!

Crane your neck to the truth-blue sky

Your eyes give you wings that travel many miles

Look to the tall inhuman, so-human buildings

and above, above –

cry out at the wondrous sight

a cloud! a seagull swooping, diving

– what do you see?

What impossibilities?

Look through the branches, past the shadowy trees,

See the dancing laughing cacophony of leaves.

And now walk on from the city and into the night,

over ancient plains whom this story writes.

Look up, into the night, now you see the sun shields,

golden flowers,

a million tiny pin-pricks – all ablaze with light.