The Sindia…

She had sails of white,

So white she looked liked,

An angel with wings billowing in the wind,

She fought back the powerful waves,

Her prow high out of the sea,

On every wave that did break,

Her back never broken, in the ocean she was,

If she could survive here, she could survive any lake…

Northward she did plunge,

Through wave and wind she did lunge,

Salt invading her every nook,

The captains’ cabin soaked, as was his every book…

She was not far off the land,

New Jersey within sight,

She knew there in Ocean City she could find a hand,

She already did pass the Sea Isle light…

A sandbar she did find with her bow so hard,

She took on water below sinking well into the bar,

She was but one hundred yards from the beach,

Seemed an eternity the beach to reach,

Most did survive her grounding,

Even she did survive the storm that made her bow rupture,

He planks and rigging ashore they did wash…

Still she does rest deep in the sandbar off that NJ town,

At one time, on stormy nights her bell could be heard, a lonely sound,

Her masts did remain at their posted positions,

Long after she did die her death on that sandbar so profound,

No more can it be seen, sunk under the waves and sand,

Like that of the rest of her courageous ship…

No longer remembered, too long ago forgotten,

Her wooden hull long since gone rotten,

A place for sea animals to reside,

She took her licks from the sea so strong,

She did nothing in life but abide,

The Sindia remembered only in history,

Nothing written down about her courage,

No, not even one lousy folk song…

        © ed ~ 9/20/04

[On December 15, 1901, almost 103 years ago, the Sindia, a 329-foot, four-masted sailing barque, ran aground on the shores of Ocean City, New Jersey. The Sindia came to rest approximately 150 yards from the beach between 16th and 17th Streets, after losing her way in a storm on the way to New York City.]