This poem is not one of my better works. It was written rather quickly, and definitely needs a re-write: the current version feels too much like something a moody teenager would have come up with. I suppose ending with a Lord Byron quote (from Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage) goes well with that?
“Fire and the Sea”
11 October 2016 in College Park, Maryland
“Fire is beautiful, isn’t it?”
I can see it well, even from back here:
beyond the ring of warmth you cling to,
half-welcomed as I stand among the shadows of night.
A part of me wishes I could join you:
that my monstrous form would not drive you away;
that the mantle of cold and dark I am wrapt in,
would not smother the fire, were I to approach.
But I must always remember what I am:
A demon born from the spray of the wine-dark Sea,
It is my nature to dwell in the cold, damp night,
Even when I yearn for fire.
Gods! Do not mock me by offering me a candle in this night:
Rather, I pray that you will let me return to the Sea,
To dissolve back into the nothingness from whence I came,
Unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.