By Annie Gombiner

This March, Harmony Hopwood, a freshman at New Rochelle High School, and Alexa Murphy, a junior at the Masters School, were named the 2023 Westchester County Youth Poet Laureates. County Executive George Latimer created this position in 2019 to encourage youth to get involved in poetry and the arts. 

“When I don’t know how to speak my feelings to those around me, I know that I can pick up a pen and paper and articulate myself that way. I’ve always been passionate about writing because of the voice it gives me. When I was younger, I felt like I didn’t have a form of expression in most situations, except for the arts, so I poured my energy into reading and writing. I remember that I would make my mom read me exactly six books every night. Then, in elementary school, the Poetry Out Loud program allowed me to share my poetry in a more structured setting. One year, I wrote a poem called “Nobody”, and another year, I wrote a poem about my hair. I kept writing all through elementary school and middle school, which led my poetry to mature. Now, I mainly write about political and social justice issues, along with my personal life. At my inauguration, I shared a poem entitled “Her brilliance”, which I wrote for Women’s History Month about all of the wonderful women in my life. That poem allowed me to pay homage to the women who helped me get to where I am, and I hope that it shows them my appreciation. With my position of Westchester Youth Poet Laureate, I want to bring more writing programs to Westchester and inspire others to write and find their voices.” - Harmony Hopwood, Westchester Youth Poet Laureate

Her brilliance

By Harmony Hopwood

My heart was built from potential.

There are flowers budding from my arteries

and light streaming out with the blood that it pumps.

It’s no miracle

It’s handcrafted

Commissioned from the women before me ,

who nurtured and tended to it, who watched me grow.

The women who defined being “difficult”,

who were made to disrupt and be heard.

Who laugh too loud and speak their mind.

The women who wept tears of anguish

and turned them into fuel to create change.

My grandmothers paved the way,

instilling the necessity for education in my lineage of hard workers.

I know that there is excellence coursing through my veins.

My mother turned storms into adventures,

bad days into a reason for car karaoke

and created a world of creativity for me to reside in.

I never wondered what was past the horizon,

never felt there was a world beyond my grasp.

I lived in between the pages riddled with fresh ink,

created art that she praised from the pavement outside our front door to pages that fill our walls.

I was given an opportunity.

Given the safe space for authenticity

and taught by the women before me to stand in my truth

as that is no threat to those that matter.

I was equipped with my grandmother's hands and my mothers brilliance.

A line of visionaries, healers, creators and success stories,

I strive to be no different.

Complacency is not permissible

and with such inspiration there is no such thing as unattainable.

I am a collage of all of their flaws and strengths

my grandmothers smile, my mothers mind

We are stubborn and proficient

freckled and fractured