Derek Walcott’s poem The Sea is History rounds out a really beautiful image that was begun by the first short film we saw, Sirenomelia. They both utilize the ocean in such an intricate way to point out human emphasis on violence as something of value, rather than destruction.

His opening of the poem, asking the sea, “Where are your monuments, your battles, martyrs?” (Walcott, line 1) reflects so much more than just his question as to why the ocean isn’t appreciated. The questions feel somewhat rhetorical, that there’s nothing to memorialize the ocean when it does so for itself. It stretches on for miles and miles; so much of this never ending mass existed long before human record, or humans themselves, did. It is his choice of wording though, that seems to trigger this idea of more than just being about the sea’s need to be recognized for its totality. He asks about monuments, these statues and physical representations of what once was in order to be faced by every following generation for its bravery; he asks about battles and martyrs, these incredibly discussed and revered objects of discussion because of their sacrifice. All of it though ties together when analyzing all of the terms base themselves in violence, in war-like imagery.

Monuments of the modern day often depict leaders of military, or political figures who incited some sort of change that often resulted in violence because of the overwhelming resorting measures to it in our culture. Battles are the most obvious, with the heavy denotation towards wartime activity, with martyrs often being seen as those involved in these battles. Relating these images, of what society often describes as frightening and gory when looked at in the present tense, to something as gentle and peaceful as the sea creates this greater comparison of how society views appreciation. It ties itself to violence; we crave it to prove our superiority and simultaneously, our appreciation for it. In order to truly be seen as an object of affection or of worth, we must prove we’re worthy through our ritualistic behavior.

This emphasis we place on it additionally seems to prove the reason that Walcott must ask the question at all: the way we view the ocean is the main reason we do not consider it an incredible source of life. In describing it as this peaceful and beautiful place, in the phrases we use of its gentle ebbing and flowing, it becomes associated with this antithesis of our culture demand for aggression. It cannot be fathomed that the ocean is a valuable part of day-to-day life and habit if it does not revolve around these primal needs to prove dominance over the rest of the beings on our territory. In order to ever have a place, it must be a part of this torturous ideal; it must carve out its name in death.