Antarctic Thesaurus

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leopard seal  letters  light  lost

letters

MIDSUMMER MIDNIGHT

The Summer sun of midnight
loves the Antarctic sky,
Her brilliant orange cloak
spreads out behind her as she flies.
Beauty;
       solar,
          cosmic,
              bright:
It is all day - there is no night.

Though night would skulk around the edge
To send a ripple through the clouds,
A swirl of shadows mixed around:

But dawn has come to herald day
And pink has pushed the night away.

WHEN SMALL IS LARGE

Truth will hide in paradox
When small is large.
Krill
Algae
Phytoplankton:
Tiny things.
Alone each detail is as nothing,
But at swarming,
Controlling.

The throb of the water cycle,
Patterns of weather,
Are woven in your tribal lands;
Remote Antarctic,
Oceans,
Ice.

Science and human knowledge
Unravel tiny strands.

To partly understand,
Just partly understand.

ANTARCTIC TRAWL

See the strange creatures
From the ocean bottom trawl,
Deep where water squeezes life
And giant octopi crawl.

Search for their secrets:
How the ocean weight is borne,
As on Atlas' shoulders.
Sea spiders,
        Starfish,
           Anemones,
              Sponges.

Life goes on,
Grows huge -
Under deep freeze.

Weird things alive in the deep -
Under deep, deep freeze.

NOTE HOME by H. Swan, 8/3/91

A short note from Antarctica,
To you so long away:
Strengths of remoteness -

An adventure frozen with beauty,
Cold, silent and robust -
Seasons of light and darkness,
Of ice and winds of chill -

Relentless in its nature,
A place of constant things.

From: Hilton Swan
Subject: Antarctic poetry
Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2008 17:19:32 +1100

Hi Lisa,

Attached is a file of poems that Jeanette wrote in 1991 (+ one from me at the end) based on my letters and notes from being away down south in the Antarctic over the summer period of 1990/91. At that time email was not yet available via the AAD and the mostly inadequate "wizzas" (eg below) were all that could be sent home via telex. So in the old traditional manner of ANARE I wrote letters to Jeanette describing the things of Antarctica, and these inspired her poems. Perhaps a few of these poems may fit into your animation website somewhere. Jeanette and i spent some time looking at your website the other night. We found it quite facinating to see how you have put so many thoughts together and used so many varying pictures and animations to illustrate them.

WYNUS,

Hilton