The Ancestral Sea: a postmodern

love story                        

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by Quinn Tyler Jackson

Let me begin, O sea of my ancestors,
by washing my nostrils with your foam
and thrusting my rope-torn hands
deeply into your cool, salty water
and bending my back to your crashing
while the seabirds cry out like muezzins
before the morning finally arrives.

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Cyrus Drake, a celebrated painter at the vanguard of modern expressionism, finds himself ensnared between the echoes of a tragic, hazy past and the harsh realities of a present where his art feels as faded as the rathskeller jazz bar he frequents. Only by revisiting his ancestral roots to confront the truths surrounding a traumatic loss can Cyrus rediscover the passion for life and art he fears has abandoned him.

His voyage is not just a return to the physical landscapes and rooms of childhood but a deep, introspective quest into the ecstatic essence underwriting his identity as both artist and human being, capable of love but wary of its risks. Against the backdrop of a postmodern love story that weaves through the bustling streets of Manhattan and the abiding antiquity of Iran’s Caspian shores, The Ancestral Sea is a poignant exploration of redemption, the enduring beauty of art, and the possibility of rebirth from the broken stonework of our past hubris.​