Shackleton

An explorer lost
at the pole, searching
for the world’s axis
ship crushed in grinding ice
sees no morning
till a distant summer
raises the sun
from dark months.

Imagine
that returning light
as mystics decribe
warm rays shining
into separation
from a supernatural face
when the dead dream about
the angel of release.

Auroras flicker
round her head;
there’s a flame
in a frozen spine.
Earth no longer
revolves, silently
blue ghosts cast
fantastic shadows.

Oriental cities rise
up into the sky’s
overturned lifeboat.
A photograph
in the underworld
means everything
to men kept alive
in eternal night.