| property | value |
|---|---|
| created | $=dv.current().file.ctime |
| modified | =this.modified |
1916-17 Greelandic-Danish ethnographer and polar explorer Knud Rasmussen, along with six others, formed the Second Thule Expedition, their purpose to chart a little-known area of the far north-western coast of Greenland, the last unknown reach.
Heart of Winter is a collection of found poems assembled from the expedition journals and the last diary entries of Wulff, who died on the expedition (of malnutrition, days before rescuers arrived.) These poems are accompanied by translations of Inuit Songs
…he was both sensitive to the landscape he traversed and the people he met along the way.
Found Poems
During the long march yesterday we were quite suddenly surprised by the visit of a young gull a storm blew it in here and it was unable to find its way back to the sea. For a long distance it fluttered feebly - until the wind seized it — carrying it further in towards the wastes and death.
The transport was difficult and of long duration partly across firns, partly across snow-drifts, but today we got out of the cauldron. On both sides high mountains fall steeply downwards into a valley of snow. Yet we’ve found great, beautiful branches of coral etched into stone — signifying that even here within this heart of winter waves of a living ocean once lapped. And thus, whist century follows century, there is only change.
The decision to write and record:
We bring merely the strictly necessary things — our kamiks, my diaries, and nothing else
Every time I sleep I dream about my home.
Beautiful ocean — I recognize you — I am home.
Inuit Songs
Movement The great sea moves me
the vast waters have sent me adrift
they move me so I tremble like a weed in the currents.
The vast sky opens me
its immensity blows through me like a wind.
It tears through me so I tremble with joy.
Wulff’s Entries
Wulff’s journal has descriptions of events but also has listings of flora and fauna interspersed.
Mrytillus uliginosa, Pyrola uniflora, Wahlbergella (large, not triflor.)
Drink warm water for supper.
Starving, but continuing to document the world around him.
When deadly indifference to life appears and weakness gets the upper hand even food phantasies disappear and the thoughts occupy themselves with those at home, and with the strange sum total of life.
Bosun catches a young hare. Driving snow, fog. Shared the entrails at once, ate them raw, warmth in the body.
Finally:
I am half-dead, but found Woodsia ilvensis Lay down at 7PM for I will not hamper the movements of my comrades upon which hangs their salvation.