by Alex Steelsmith
“After nine months stuck in the [moving Weddell Sea ice] pack… the ship slid down
to her frigid grave. No one ever expected to see the stout little ship again…
[Until 107 years later…] Out of the abysmal darkness, a century’s worth of wonder,
history, and legend filled the screen. The port side of the Endurance, still
resplendent… as if it sank yesterday, emerged from the gloom.”
—National Geographic
Shackleton’s vessel was moving, although
Nature compelled her to go with the floe,
Shackled in irons of north-drifting ice
Slowly becoming a merciless vise.
Thus, he would launch his historical trip
After the Weddell had swallowed his ship;
Fractured and scuttled, Endurance was doomed
Never again to be seen, he assumed.
More than a century later—behold!—
Deep in the fathomless darkness and cold,
Shackleton’s ship is impossibly found
Upright, her timbers astoundingly sound.
Cameras robotically panning the wreck
Capture the brittle stars manning her deck;
Life, to perennial hardship, inures.
Shackleton lives, and Endurance endures.