Sandburg gives voice to fire itself—molten heat moving far beneath the ocean floor. It calls someone “brother,” though the two have never met and may not meet for thousands of years. The speaker feels patient, even tender, promising to warm and hold this brother close. But there’s a quiet power behind that promise. “Use you and change you” suggests transformation that could be as destructive as it is intimate. The mood is enormous and slow, like geological time, mixing affection with inevitability. You’re left sensing the speaker’s utter certainty: the meeting will happen, no matter how long it takes. The “brother” could be the surface world, a coastline, or humanity itself, but the feeling is the same—a hidden, unstoppable force waiting for its moment to embrace and remake whatever it touches.
Kin — Summary
Brother, I am fire Surging under the ocean floor. I shall never meet you, brother — Not for years, anyhow; Maybe thousands of years, brother. Then I will warm you, Hold you close, wrap you in circles, Use you and change you — Maybe thousands of years, brother.