Empress of Ireland

[ckeo]

Empress' treasure lay buried
beneath cloaking veils of time
held close were secret memories
of those they left behind.

From rolling fog into a load of coal
at the end of a journey she plied
tales untold no cries were bold
one thousand and twelve had died.

Brinnen's lot they soon forgot
as pages and years passed by
surfacing for a Canadian plot
a source of centennial pride ?
~ckeo~

RE:Canada's own Titanic disaster

[abu nuwas]

I am not sure about 'Fun'. It was fascinating to read about this naval tragedy, and I tried to discover, with no luck, whether there were any plans to raise the vessel.

Mr Brinnen seems to have had problems all of his own. I very much liked 'as pages and years passed by', and I hope that this man's efforts to bring the event to public attention will be successful. I think I should have been strict with the meter, but otherwise, a tale well told, tho you may care to correct s.2 l.3 to 'cries'.

[billy]

a nice if sad little poem (cries as abu said, though this is said in fun and not as a critique)
i have to admit to never having heard of the disaster before.
it has a softness to it that's more implied than real which i like.

[addy]

A nice little tribute... I especially liked how the scale built up from the first to the second stanza. Your question mark at the end is jarring, thoughtful, and apt. In history we do try to remember things, to commemorate, but sometimes it isn't so clear what we really mean to achieve by it.

[ckeo]

I am not sure about 'Fun'. It was fascinating to read about this naval tragedy, and I tried to discover, with no luck, whether there were any plans to raise the vessel.

Mr Brinnen seems to have had problems all of his own. I very much liked 'as pages and years passed by', and I hope that this man's efforts to bring the event to public attention will be successful. I think I should have been strict with the meter, but otherwise, a tale well told, tho you may care to correct s.2 l.3 to 'cries'.

Thanks, I fixed cries.
As to raising the vessel, apparently it has been concluded as being not possible
Unfortunately the newyork times are bastards with a pay wall so access to the full article is not possible. Brinnen was an idiot, so many lives lost and the impact to their families should not have been downplayed like that. I grew up by the sea in a maritime fishing community. I have been on the ocean during rough seas, we fished, as were all the people in my community and the surrounding ones, so I am really appalled that we never learned of this in school. I cant be strict with meter because I never try to write with it and any meter present is purely accidental.

---

a nice if sad little poem (cries as abu said, though this is said in fun and not as a critique)
i have to admit to never having heard of the disaster before.
it has a softness to it that's more implied than real which i like.

Thanks, I wrote it after reading the article with my morning coffee,
it really angered me that very little attention had been given to it before.
It was the first I had heard of it also.

[rayheinrich]

.
"The Empress of Ireland's cat Emmy, an orange tabby who had never once
missed a voyage, refused to board the ship before its departure on May 28, 1914.
The crew could not coax her aboard, so the Empress departed without her.
It was reported that Emmy watched the ship sail away from Quebec City
sitting on the roof of the shed at Pier 27, which would later serve
as a temporary morgue for the dead pulled from the river after the
Empress went down."
( from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland )

P.S. There are two orange tabbies in the lot I live with.
One is the most Delphic (term selected with Leanne in mind),
and the other, the horniest (who knows?). However, either
seems a possible explanation.

[ckeo]

A nice little tribute... I especially liked how the scale built up from the first to the second stanza. Your question mark at the end is jarring, thoughtful, and apt. In history we do try to remember things, to commemorate, but sometimes it isn't so clear what we really mean to achieve by it.

Thanks. I was not sure how well the question mark fit in, but it felt right.
With all the attention that the Titanic has received in the past ten years or so, I would have thought this would have came out. For it to come to light now as the centennial of its disaster approaches is just wrong.

---

.
"The Empress of Ireland's cat Emmy, an orange tabby who had never once
missed a voyage, refused to board the ship before its departure on May 28, 1914.
The crew could not coax her aboard, so the Empress departed without her.
It was reported that Emmy watched the ship sail away from Quebec City
sitting on the roof of the shed at Pier 27, which would later serve
as a temporary morgue for the dead pulled from the river after the
Empress went down."
( from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland )

P.S. There are two orange tabbies in the lot I live with.
One is the most Delphic (term selected with Leanne in mind),
and the other, the horniest (who knows?). However, either
seems a possible explanation.

I wanted to fit the cat into the poem but I was pressed for time.
It might be a worthwhile challenge for someone to write a poem from
Emmy's point of view, I think it would be interesting.

[abu nuwas]

.
"The Empress of Ireland's cat Emmy, an orange tabby who had never once
missed a voyage, refused to board the ship before its departure on May 28, 1914.
The crew could not coax her aboard, so the Empress departed without her.
It was reported that Emmy watched the ship sail away from Quebec City
sitting on the roof of the shed at Pier 27, which would later serve
as a temporary morgue for the dead pulled from the river after the
Empress went down."
( from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland )

P.S. There are two orange tabbies in the lot I live with.
One is the most Delphic (term selected with Leanne in mind),
and the other, the horniest (who knows?). However, either
seems a possible explanation.

Strange that anyone would write about the cat -- and two conflicting stories. I would put my money on the cat escaping. But wtf is an orange tabby? A tortoiseshell? Or just an old ginger mog with a stripe or two?

[ckeo]

.
"The Empress of Ireland's cat Emmy, an orange tabby who had never once
missed a voyage, refused to board the ship before its departure on May 28, 1914.
The crew could not coax her aboard, so the Empress departed without her.
It was reported that Emmy watched the ship sail away from Quebec City
sitting on the roof of the shed at Pier 27, which would later serve
as a temporary morgue for the dead pulled from the river after the
Empress went down."
( from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland )

P.S. There are two orange tabbies in the lot I live with.
One is the most Delphic (term selected with Leanne in mind),
and the other, the horniest (who knows?). However, either
seems a possible explanation.

Strange that anyone would write about the cat -- and two conflicting stories. I would put my money on the cat escaping. But wtf is an orange tabby? A tortoiseshell? Or just an old ginger mog with a stripe or two?

As, I stated above we fished, I had a dog that loved to come with us,
except one beautiful sunny calm and clear morning when he was very distressed at the thought and you could not drag him into the boat if you wanted to... not alive anyway. Turned out to be the worst day I ever had on the water.

Back in those days people were superstitious more so than now, people looked for signs that foretold these events after they happened. Animals as it seems, are very in tune with the weather and many disasters could have been prevented if people had been wiser and listened to them.

[abu nuwas]

.
"The Empress of Ireland's cat Emmy, an orange tabby who had never once
missed a voyage, refused to board the ship before its departure on May 28, 1914.
The crew could not coax her aboard, so the Empress departed without her.
It was reported that Emmy watched the ship sail away from Quebec City
sitting on the roof of the shed at Pier 27, which would later serve
as a temporary morgue for the dead pulled from the river after the
Empress went down."
( from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Empress_of_Ireland )

P.S. There are two orange tabbies in the lot I live with.
One is the most Delphic (term selected with Leanne in mind),
and the other, the horniest (who knows?). However, either
seems a possible explanation.

Strange that anyone would write about the cat -- and two conflicting stories. I would put my money on the cat escaping. But wtf is an orange tabby? A tortoiseshell? Or just an old ginger mog with a stripe or two?

As, I stated above we fished, I had a dog that loved to come with us,
except one beautiful sunny calm and clear morning when he was very distressed at the thought and you could not drag him into the boat if you wanted to... not alive anyway. Turned out to be the worst day I ever had on the water.

Back in those days people were superstitious more so than now, people looked for signs that foretold these events after they happened. Animals as it seems, are very in tune with the weather and many disasters could have been prevented if people had been wiser and listened to them.

I must apologise -I somehow completely missed your first reply. Re meter, I only meant that that is what I would do, I did not intend it negatively. Perhaps it was rather clumsily put.

I am sorry to say that I have been bequeathed a whole host of superstitions-- black dog, two magpies, bottle-green, the usual ladders, salt-over-the shoulder, and finger-crossing. It is interesting that people of olden times had it partly right with animals: seagulls inland will betoken bad weather, and as for dogs, their sense of smell is so fine, that they can smell cancers, it seems.

We have a family story about 'don't go to the boating party' and you can imagine what happened to those who went!

I think anything you write about the sea will attract me, just as I like the old shanties.

[rayheinrich]

Orange Tabby