Christina Hauck
To William Brewster with One Foot on the Plank*
Southampton Water, England. August 4, 1620
Stop. Don’t board that ship. Lead your flock back
to their homes. Pray for the strength to live
and die by faith—even if it means shackles,
lonely weeks in a windowless cell, shivering
doubt the rest of your days. Bend to the Scavenger’s
Daughter until blood seeps through your pores.
And when you mount the pyre, look to your Savior
and praise the flames that bring your soul closer
to Him than the sins you will commit: betraying
the hand of friendship, bequeathing hatred and fear
to generations of children. Look ahead—Captain Mason
has torched the Pequod Fort, barred the door.
His men gut everyone who tries to escape, praise
God for guiding their arms, mistake murder for Grace.
*Notes “William Brewster” (1566/7-1644): according to historian Harold Kirk-Smith, Brewster was “the backbone, brain, and conscience” of the Mayflower expedition and Plymouth Colony. One of my 10th great-grandfathers.
Southampton Water: The Mayflower’s point of departure.
“Scavenger’s daughter”: a torture device invented by Henry VIII that contorts its victim into a variety of excruciating poses.
“Captain Mason” […] “Pequod Fort”: Captain John Mason was sent by the Connecticut Council to prosecute the war against the Pequod Indians (1637). He and his forces set fire to a fort where approximately ¾ of the tribe was harboring, on the banks of the Mystic River (1638). The tribe was formally dissolved and surviving members adopted into neighboring tribes or shipped to Barbados as slaves.
“This poem arises from research motived by three questions: 1. Were any of my ancestors directly involved in any of the thousands of genocidal actions taken against any indigenous tribes on the North American continent? 2. In what ways did my ancestors directly benefit from any such genocidal action? 3. What benefits have accrued to me and what reparations can I make? This poem addresses the genocide of the Pequot peoples in 1638, one of the few tribes to refuse to accommodate the Puritan settlers (or squatters). I am addressing William Brewster because he is a direct ancestor and because he seems to have been a kind and sincere man with considerable influence over the Mayflower party. Much of the imagery of religious persecution in England is indebted to William Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation.” —Christina Hauck
A Pushcart nominated poet and Yaddo fellow, Christina Hauck lives on unceded land of the Kaw Indian Nation in Lawrence, KS with her wife and other mammals. Her poems have appeared most recently in Coal City Review, Anacarpa Review, and Sheila-Na-Gig. Her manuscript, An Angel and Other Apparitions, was a finalist for the Gunpowder Press Barry Spacks Poetry Prize (2025).