The Flying-Fish Sailor
'The Western Ocean rolls and roars
From Sandy Hook to Europe's shores,
From Fastnet Light to Portland, Maine,
And Newport News and back again,
With Boston, Salem, Montreal,
And plenty o' ports both large and small,
And them that like may keep 'em all,
Not me,' says the flying-fish sailor.
The Western Ocean roars and rolls
With all its deeps and all its shoals
And many a thundering wintry gale,
And many a storm of rain and hail,
And let who likes have sleet and snow,
And driving fog and drifting floe,
For South away and Eastward Ho!
Is the road for the flying-fish sailor.
In Blackwall Dock she is moored,
Her hatches on and her stores aboard,
In Blackwall Dock she lies to-day,
And she will sail when the morning's grey
For Sunda Strait and Singapore,
And Palembang and plenty more,
And many a swarming Eastern shore
That's known to the flying-fish sailor.
The girls they'll cry and the lads'll shout
When the blooming tugboat warps her out:
We'll drop the pilot off the Nore
With fond farewells to take ashore
To mothers, wives and sweethearts too -
Love to Sally and love to Sue -
And that's the last for a year or two
You'll see of the flying-fish sailor.
We'll drop the tug and we'll bear away
Down the Channel, across the Bay;
The Western Isles we'll leave behind
And make the Line with the good Trade wind:
We'll see the dolphins sport and play,
(And haul our yards ten times a day),
While South'ard still we beat our way,
The way of the flying-fish sailor.
And forty south when we have passed,
Her easting down she runs at last,
Where the white whale swims in the far South Sea,
And the brave West winds blow full and free:
The good old winds they bluster and blow
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poem by Cicely Fox Smith
Added by Poetry Lover
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