Beyond the Burning Sea

A Poem for Election Season

William Bauly — “Fate of the Rebel Flag” (painting, 1861)

As election day approaches in the United States, I’ve been sitting with this poem I wrote back in 2017, published this year in Firewords Magazine. It’s a timely word about where my ultimate hope lies, and I hope it will be a gift to you in this season. Here’s the poem, followed by a couple notes.

Beyond the Burning Sea

Beyond the burning sea
of demagoguery,
     whose faultless captains steer
their captive crowds around
the promised perils found
     in water colored fear—

and standing further still,
beyond the bustling hill
     of bright democracy,
its wagered hopes heaped high
on people to defy
     their own depravity—

there calls a King once crowned
with thorns who, dying, wound
     into his soul the fear
and pride that live inside
of us—to open wide
     the door to heaven, here.

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A Couple Notes…

On form: For this poem, I used an AABCCB rhyme scheme and very tight lines of iambic trimeter (da-dum da-dum da­-dum), which made it quite challenging to write. Every few words, it was time to rhyme again! I also worked to keep each stanza a distinct thematic “room.” I really enjoyed the challenge of it and, looking back, it was after this poem that I really began to explore and fall in love with rhymed and metered poetic forms such as villanelles, pantoums, and, my eventual favorite, sonnets.

On the image: William Bauly painted this Unionist work of art near the beginning of the U.S. Civil War. The flames of the sinking ship are stylized as the early “Stars and Bars” Confederate flag. While my poem ultimately points beyond politics as our hope, our politics do matter, and I find this striking image a fitting introduction to the poem.

Thanks for reading! I’d love it if you would leave a comment below with any thoughts, and subscribe to my newsletter if you haven’t yet.