Monday, 20 October 2025

Dear Future Generations: Sorry - Prince Ea


Richard Williams, who is known as Prince Ea is an American rapper, spoken word artist and civil rights activist.  His spoken word poetry has earned him global recognition as a social influencer on peace and civil rights with a focus on education.  His spoken word poem, "Dear Future Generations: Sorry" that was released in 2015 was an apology letter to the future generations who would inherit an Earth destroyed irrevocably by climate change.

Prince Ea begins his 'Dear Future Generation: Sorry" by saying, on behalf of the present generation he apologizes to the future generations for leaving them behind an uninhabitable earth.  It was because of their indiscriminate use of resources.  They didn't realize how special the earth was.  They didn't know what they had until it was gone.  It was their greed that made the Amazon rain forest, a desert.  There were billions of trees that cleaned up our pollution, stored and purified our water and fed us.  As they put profit above people, greed over need, the rule of gold above the golden rule, they destroyed everything.  They never realized how fast the ice was melting in the Arctic.  When they realized their mistakes, the earth had already been damaged to a great extent.

Towards the end of the poem, Prince Ea shifts his apology into a call of action.  He suggests a way to set right things.  Instead of depending the politicians and the government for the care of the planet, the people should come forward to save the earth.  If we fail to work together to save the environment, we all will be extinct with the environment.  Thus the poem criticizes consumerism and reflects the concept of intergenerational responsibility.  The rhetorical questions, the tone of regret and the repetitions in the poem emphasize the central theme, the need to save the earth to save us, till the end.


------Thulasidharan V

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