The Mariners' Song-The Mariners

The Mariners' Song - The Mariners We are two mariners Our ship's sole survivors In this belly of a whale It's ribs are ceiling beams It's guts are carpeting I guess we have some time to kill You may not remember me I was a child of three And you, a lad of eighteen But, I remember you And I will relate to you How our histories interweave At the time you were A rake and a roustabout Spending all your money On the whores and hounds (Oh, oh) You had a charming air All cheap and debonair My widowed mother found so sweet And so she took you in Her sheets still warm with him Now filled with filth and foul disease As time wore on you proved A debt-ridden drunken mess Leaving my mother A poor consumptive wretch (Oh, oh) And then you disappeared Your gambling arrears The only thing you left behind And then the magistrate Reclaimed our small estate And my poor mother lost her mind Then, one day in spring My dear sweet mother died But, before she did I took her hand as she, dying, cried: (Oh, oh) "Find him, find him Tie him to a pole and break His fingers to splinters Drag him to a hole until he Wakes up naked Clawing at the ceiling Of his grave" It took me fifteen years To swallow all my tears Among the urchins in the street Until a priory Took pity and hired me To keep their vestry nice and neat But, never once in the employ Of these holy men Did I ever, once turn my mind From the thought of revenge (Oh, oh) One night I overheard The prior exchanging words With a penitent whaler from the sea The captain of his ship Who matched you toe to tip Was known for wanton cruelty The following day I shipped to sea With a privateer And in the whistle Of the wind I could almost hear (Oh, oh) "Find him, find him Tie him to a pole and break His fingers to splinters Drag him to a hole until he Wakes up naked Clawing at the ceiling Of his grave There is one thing I must say to you As you sail across the sea Always, your mother will watch over you As you avenge this wicked deed" And then, that fateful night We had you in our sight After twenty months, it seemed Your starboard flank abeam I was getting my muskets clean When came this rumbling from beneath The ocean shook The sky went black And the captain quailed And before us grew The angry jaws Of a giant whale (Oh) Don't know how I survived The crew all was chewed alive I must have slipped between his teeth But, oh, what providence What divine intelligence That you should survive As well as me It gives my eye great joy To see your eyes fill with fear To lean in close And I will whisper The last words you'll hear (Oh, oh)