Andy Flemming, group creative director at M&C Saatchi, created for the Sydney Film Festival the following poem, Stories, about the importance of creativity, debate, discovery and truth-telling:
Once upon a time
there was the story.
A glorious tale told to flame danced faces
In deserts and castles and faraway places.
The story remembered by past generations
And carried through battles between furious nations.
It cares not for decorum.
It hears no decrees.
It refuses commandments
It won’t stand for these
calls for silence.
Because it has to be heard.
The endless protector
The fearless collector
The flickering projector
The keeper of the sound
and the absurd.
Stories tell us who we are.
Who we can be.
They let us see
life from eyes not our own.
From the near,
from the far.
From journeys through thunder.
We can go over and under
The silver topped mountains,
The impossible plains.
We can pull back the curtain
And break all the chains.
Because stories can break our hearts.
Make us laugh in the dark.
Make us see through the lies.
Draw a vast question mark.
Over the great and the good.
And make us wonder if we should
Change things for the better.
The world has stories to tell.
And they need to be told.
Without stories, we’re left in the darkness.
We’re out in the cold.
We can’t move without growing.
We can’t think without knowing.
We don’t know what’s coming.
So we need stories to keep going.
Now watch stars of Australian film turn the poem into a performance:
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