All-American Sestina by Florence Cassen Mayers
Mayers’ mastery of the Sestina is impeccable as she uses the form to compress as many American ideals as possible into her poem. The numbers one, two, three, four, five, and six are her intertwining and repeating theme. She incorporates those numbers into each stanza, giving the poem the feel of a children's rhyme or game. The poem follows no rhyme scheme and has a blatant lack of proper punctuation, emphasizing its unsophisticated construction. Within each of her stanzas, the content has no pattern; the subjects cannot connect them. The poem encompasses symbols of life, death, and everything in between. This poem's simplicity reflects the defining traits of America, revealing that an uncomplicated life is best. Her references to sports, the suburbs, history, TV shows, music, and everyday phrases that have fallen into the slang of Americans evokes both nostalgia and patriotism.
As the poem opens with the recognizable line from the Pledge of Allegiance, which any school child would have memorized, she stirs the nationalistic feelings almost tongue-in-cheek. It goes on to reference nearly everything associated with America that has a positive connotation. Every item or event referenced displays the consumer-obsessed society, but also the good times that come with that attitude, the positives of the progress greed essentially has brought upon Americans. Her epitaph for the country of America is a double-edged sword, in how everything is sentimental to the countrymen, but while it reflects America not everything in the mirror is flattering when put all together. Her poem is a wonderful and intricate puzzle of past and present ideals within the country that cover a variety of life's experiences, and there is undoubtedly a country song focused on each of the topics Mayers listed in her poem.
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