Dead Men and Sinners

We set out for sea with icicles in our beards
where the wind bit like dog's teeth
and the sea swept our ship up like the hand of a god that had been enraged
so we carried our dead to the shore
and that left nine more
there was violence in the air tonight
when the ship split in half we lost two to the brine
and the seawater swilled across the floor
and the captain lives no more
for he sleeps on the ocean floor
the old bastard was as big as a bear
his coffin was made of a redwood's trunk
his appetite never thinned
his belly was wide as two barrels of gin
cut the engine
tie it off to the post
heave away at my call
listen well one and all
we'll be rid of this scourge
when his body goes overboard
he'd been in irons for seventy days
fed just gunpowder to fuel his rage
screamed bloody murder and tore at his chains
we made him this way
we were left on that isle
with a skeleton crew
made of dead men and sinners
hell-bound through and thorugh
then it was HE who came to our shore
and he left no more