School Lessons

There is always some sadness in learning.

When we were nine we embarked on a tour
of the Thirty –Two Counties, Sister Joseph's tipped cane

pointing the way. At Belfast Shipyard inauspicious

clouds gathered over the half-built Titanic:

A cross-channel steamer at a high rate of speed

ranging her on her moorings, parting her long fore and aft

springs, causing the wire hawser to fall suddenly on one

of the scows on which several men were working. If only

they’d heeded CP from Harland and Woolf Ltd- they’d have known

she was jinxed. She was ship 401, and by the time the cane had drilled-

home the fate of all of her predecessors our ship was running

out of steam. We took a north-westerly route, navigating

the coastline as far as the Giant’s Causeway, but it was there

that our engine failed. No crank of cylinder across the Border

and into the Free State. We had to settle for the Six Counties.

Copyright with Cathy Leonard 2016

https://nmni.com/titanic/Design-Build/Harland---Wolff/Belfasts-Titanic-Shipyard.aspx