About “The Lost Generation”

“The Lost Generation” is a poem about both cynicism and optimism that became viral upon winning second place in AARP’s 2007 U@50 video contest, wherein contestants were told to create a two-minute video describing their vision of the future. For contrasting perspectives, read to the end, then read in reverse starting from “There is hope” and continuing upward, as instructed in the last line.

In a 2013 Reddit poll of users' favorite poems, “The Lost Generation” received the most upvotes.