Lost is an illustration for a poem by Ian Longstaff. We’ve submitted this piece to cardboard collective.

Here’s a few variations on the theme. Ian’s poem is full of visual metaphor already, so I was anxious that my illustration didn’t just represent one of those existing ideas. Hopefully my solution has added a little to the piece as well as providing some atmsophere.

Ian’s poem:

LOST

You know when you’re driving
and you arrive somewhere
and then can’t remember
how you got there…?

That’s how I feel now about LIVING.

How did I miss all the signposts the warnings
the flashing lights?

What am I doing on auto-pilot
on the road to Nowhere City?

And how did I end up towing all this baggage?
Half of it’s not mine, I swear!
I reckon it was planted on me
by bent cops from the emotional police

Then there was that guy chasing after me
I drove faster, thinking he was mad

It wasn’t until he pulled alongside
that I realised who he was…

He was me.

And all the while he’d been trying to tell me
that we were on the wrong road.

 

The final piece will feature the poem as part of the illustration.