The Shabby Years
Once we shipped aboard a trainer
Midshipmen with pale hands
Bright young buckles in the sunshine
Haul away to distant lands
Now we gather in the parlour
Telling stories from the past
Circumnavigate the table
Turn a memory, raise a glass
Here an admiral, there a captain
Bible-bound and dim with beer
Ticking clocks and landlocked sailors
Counting down the shabby years
Once we shipped aboard a frigate
Sailed at Ushant in the van
Mustered all in blue and bloodstains
Did the work of thirty men
Now we sit and watch the weather
All along the harbour wall
Classifying brig and barque
Till sunset strikes the dog watch bell
Once we shipped aboard a slaver
Dirty work for bitter hands
Every voyage a kind of failure
Haul away to Guinea sands
Haul away to Guinea sands
Haul away to Guinea sands
© MarkGSongs 2011