Polaris In The Eye Poem by Stan Petrovich

Our ship broke apart
Like so many paddle-boards,
Crushed between bergs
And attendant ice floes.
All hands were lost,
Into the frigid waters tossed,
Except me and my cur, Mutton,
Who, gravely injured, would die too soon.
I used him as warmth for awhile,
Then he transfigured into merely a useful bunch of frozen fur.
I had a partial tent
That, torn by the searing blow,
Became a mere sieve in the howl ahead.

To some Eskimo fires I had spied
In the distance
I prepared to go; my beard milky white,
The only way to live, to vie,
I trundled on, chewing warmth, Polaris in the eye.