The Speaker

The speaker in "Sea Church" makes a variety of requests that demonstrate her love for nature and for poetry itself. The imperatives "give me" and "hide me" contribute to a firm tone that remains reverential as the speaker outlines a vision for her writing process. Though the speaker requests to be hidden away in the third stanza, she still releases her "water-prayer" out into the world. This "water-prayer" might be understood as a poem, and the speaker goes on to compare it to sky lanterns rising in the night sky among constellations of figures that take no notice. In other words, the speaker intends to write and share her work no matter the wider cultural response.

A Higher Power

The speaker invokes a higher power through her instructions and requests. Since this higher power does not take form as an embodied character or even a singular concept...