Burning Ship

The poem “Casabianca” by Felicia Hemans mentions about virus images. However, the most dominant image is of the flames. The ‘burning deck’ and ‘rolling flames’ are mentioned several times in the poem. The image of flames recur within the poem and sets the scene of the poem.
The flames mentioned in the poem are symbol of destruction. The fire sets a theme of a war and people getting killed. The little boy is surrounded by dead bodies and is helpless. He saw his father dying in front of him, which put him into a shock. He can not think of anything and asking his father for help. But his father is not alive any more. There is also some very good alteration of rhyme in the poem, such as form and storm. ‘Form’ and ‘storm’ are totally two different words and have opposite meanings. If one is creations, then the other one is destruction.
When I was reading the poem, I kept thinking that is there nobody else on the ship to help the boy? Is he the only one left on the ship? He kept seeking help from him father, because as a child, he feel safe with his father. The boy is very courageous. He did not care about the danger that was about to come, in fact he was with his father the entire time. Another thing that I noticed in the poem was that the boy was very obedient. He asked his father if his task is done. The flames represented darkness in the poem and danger for the boy. This poem reminds me of many historical wars and disasters. It reminds me of all the children who became orphans and left in danger. The ‘rolling flames’ mentioned in the poem are part of every child’s life out there in the world who lost his or her loved ones. Terrorism, which is the biggest fear of every child in the world, puts the future of the world in flames.

http://www.learnenglish.de/newimages/illustrations/fire.jpg
http://fc32.deviantart.com/fs16/f/2007/214/a/9/The_Burning_Ship_by_Jurrivortex.jpg