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by Clion
Now swing the lamp and settle down,
hear the old salt’s tale
of when men went, in bye-gone days
in ships that still had sail.
In stormy seas the sailors prayed
But in other warm and sunny days
Below the jutting figure head
The bold, wild, lovely dolphin played
The captain was a Demon, they said;
he treated a man like a dog
and how one time was put the vitriol
in the old villains cup of nightly grog.
Below decks in snatched moments
whisper had it that he was of Hell
and it was with raised cloven foot
he would kick the change-watch bell.
It was said he was of ancient age
he had known life on the Nile
when the Pharaoh’s rule extended
for mile on mile upon mile.
The Secret Ways were known to him
but Akhenaton cast him out
cursing him to roam the seas
without human man’s respite
Many ships that he captained
foundered by storm from the sky
many crewmen died by drowning
but he can never die.
by flageolet
I must go down to the seas again,
To the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship
And a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song
And the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face
And a Waterford dawn breaking