The Ticket

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Object No. 89 'Titanic' Launch Ticket

Ulster Folk & Transport Museum

As I held the tattered, worn ticket in my old wrinkled hand,

Floods of memories washed over me,

Pangs of grief wrapped around me,

Entangling me,

Threatening to drag me down under the surface of the gloomy waters,

Threatening to drown me.

Yet not all my memories were painful,

I remember a time when I was free,

Even happy,

Having thrown off the shackles of hunger and death,

Looking forward to a better life,

Holding this same ticket,

New and freshly printed,

How was I to know that my future was cursed?

As I boarded that fine vessel,

With my brother at my side,

He and I – the last remainder of our family.

This ship depicted wealth and prosperity,

Encouraging us to forget what we left behind.

But how could it prepare us for what was to come?

That ship was doomed,

Ever since it left its Irish shore,

Doomed to sink beneath the icy waters,

My brother had to stay behind,

Considered a man at seventeen,

While I climbed into the waiting lifeboat.

I watched as the ship cracked in two,

As it plunged down,

Taking my brother to his watery grave,

I heard screams all around me,

Screams of the dying,

As time went on they grew less and less,

Silenced by the cruel seas.

Somehow I managed to keep that ticket,

All these years,

Something to help me remember,

A part of me wanted to forget,

 But I know I must move on,

Make a new life,

Start again,

For the sake of those who cannot.