On that day, all derided the Captain, all scoffed;
Ship’s boy, skipper - all swore fast and loud.
Proudly rearing and tearing their bandages off.
Sailors bellowed and raged in the shrouds.

Then the doors of our brains
Off the hinges were torn
And were carried away
To a mirage-like shore.

In the faraway Promised Lands landing,
Lands Columbian and Magellanian.

But it seems I will not
See those lands newly found:
Doing eight or nine knots
I ran firmly aground.

Ours were dangerous goals,
But the brave lads were game.
Someone steered for the shoals.
I’m the one more to blame.

Then my brothers sailed on - I was left all alone.
The more sensitive ones swallowed spray,
And without me the great daring voyage went on -
They just wrote me off, and sailed away.

Roundly cursing the weather,
Pate and pitiless chance,
They sailed off, all together,
My unfortunate sons.

First, two salvoes, and then they would sail on:
Hail, Columbus! And then hail, Magellan!

I drink foam as the waves
Slap my sides - I don’t care.
Decks to bottom the staves
Have been crashed and laid bare.

Slime and seaweed and gore
Thickly cover my sides.
You can look at my sores -
I have nothing to hide.

Here’s a cannonball furrow, quite close to the frame;
Here are scars left by ramming and fire;
You can see where I was many years ago maimed
By a pirate’s well-honed grappling irons.

Look, my keel is uneven,
As if gnawed by huge teeth -
My lean belly was riven
Long ago by a reef.

I am rolling and naming and wheezing
Though I’ve been on the high seas well seasoned.

Winds are sucking my blood
Creeping for’ard by stealth.
Whipping starboard to port...
Winds, they will be my death.

They lambaste me and wail
From first light to first light,
They are driving long nails
In my soul day and night.

Like unbidden guests out on a rampage, the swine,
Winds kick everything here upside down.
How I wish that they choked in my dark holds on wine,
Or in fury pulled me off the ground.

They’re stronger, that’s sure -
I’m a wild beast at bay.
But it’s not the winds’ fury
That’ll help me today.

Like thin arms are my masts, thin and frail.
Like an old woman’s breasts are my sails.

This will be the eighth wonder -
A generous swell
Will sweep over and under
My mouldy old shell.

I will shake off the spell,
I will rise on a crest,
And my white sails will swell
Like a young maiden’s breast.

I’ll catch up with the fleet, I will show no disdain
For my kin who chose not to remember.
I will let my old crew come on board once again.
I will not rake old memories’ embers.

But there’s no room for me
In the fleet line today.
You play dangerously,
Cruiser - out of my way!

Are we brothers or not?
I got out of a hole...
Frigate, bear hard a-port.
There’s enough sea for all...

That it should come to this -
You reject me, by God!
Once one’s stuck on the reefs,
Is one wiped out for good?

Open ranks, heed my call,
We’re all ships in the end,
There’s enough sea for all
And there is enough land,

So look forward, men, to happy landings
In Columbian lands and Magellanian.