Antarctica

[Intro] Wind across the ice, silence at the bottom of the world [Verse 1] At the bottom of the world lies the fifth-largest continent, ninety-eight percent of it sleeping under ice, an ice sheet up to three miles deep in places, holding seventy percent of Earth's fresh water, frozen tight. At Vostok Station, nineteen eighty-three, the air fell to eighty-nine below, the coldest ever measured, no capital, no country, no permanent home, just the southern lights and a wind that moans. [Pre-Chorus] Scientists in summer, penguins through the storm, huddled in the darkness, keeping one another warm [Chorus] Antarctica, the white continent, kept for peace and science by the treaty's word, emperor penguins in the blizzard, the quietest place on Earth, where only ice is heard [Verse 2] Amundsen reached the Pole in nineteen eleven, Scott came weeks later, and he never made it home, Shackleton's Endurance, crushed in the Weddell Sea ice, yet every one of her crew made it home. In fifty-nine, twelve nations signed the Antarctic Treaty, no weapons and no war, a continent for science to share, mining banned by the Madrid Protocol, the ice cores hold eight hundred thousand years of air. [Chorus] Antarctica, the white continent, kept for peace and science by the treaty's word, emperor penguins in the blizzard, the quietest place on Earth, where only ice is heard [Bridge] Krill beneath the sea ice feeding whales upon the tide, Weddell seals are singing underneath the frozen sky, in nineteen eighty-five the ozone hole was found down here, a warning from the bottom of the world to keep the sky alive. [Final Chorus] Antarctica, the white continent, kept for peace and science by the treaty's word, emperor penguins in the blizzard, the quietest place on Earth, where only ice is heard [Outro] Silence at the bottom of the world, Antarctica