SuitabookTo this day
Shane Koyczan
- Reading
- Read it with time to pause between spreads. Discuss feelings and choices rather than asking for personal disclosures, then look at the appended resources together if the subject feels close to home.
- Themes
- Bullying and responsibility: The work addresses people who have experienced bullying, observed it or participated in it, and urges readers not to remain silent. Bullying is presented as harmful, with attention to the responsibility of speaking rather than saying nothing.
- Self-image and lasting effects: The speaker describes growing up with beliefs about being unlovable and lonely, linking bullying with lasting damage to self-image. The poem explores the emotional consequences of harmful treatment rather than presenting bullying as trivial or harmless.
- Words and visual interpretation: Thirty artists contribute varied collages and visual styles alongside the poem’s words. The changing artwork appears to modulate the poem’s emotional movement, offering multiple interpretations of the same written work.
- Worth knowing
- Pay attention to the contrast between confronting harmful behaviour and offering a healing or hopeful response. The introductory note and appended resources may provide useful openings for further support.