Ere our last rope slipped the quay and we made for the open sea
You became one of us.
You have seen the force of the gale fierce as a thresher’s flail
Beat the sea white;
You have watched our reeling spars sweep past the steady stars
In the storm-wracked night.
You saw great liners turn; high bows that seemed to churn
The swell we wallowed in;
They veered from their ordered ways, from the need of their time kept days,