Heh! Walk her round. Heave, ah, heave her short again!
Over, ****** her over, there, and hold her on the pawl.
Loose all sail, and brace your yards aback and full—
Ready jib to pay her off and heave short all!
  Well, ah, fare you well; we can stay no more with you, my love—
   Down, set down your liquor and your girl from off your knee;
         For the wind has come to say:
         “You must take me while you may,
      If you’d go to Mother Carey
      (Walk her down to Mother Carey!),
   Oh, we’re bound to Mother Carey where she feeds her chicks at sea!”

Heh! Walk her round. Break, ah, break it out o’ that!
Break our starboard-bower out, apeak, awash, and clear!
Port—port she casts, with the harbour-mud beneath her foot,
And that’s the last o’ bottom we shall see this year!
  Well, ah, fare you well, for we’ve got to take her out again—
   Take her out in ballast, riding light and cargo-free.
      And it’s time to clear and quit
      When the hawser grips the bitt,
   So we’ll pay you with the foresheet and a promise from the sea!

Heh! Tally on. Aft and walk away with her!
Handsome to the cathead, now; O tally on the fall!
Stop, seize and fish, and easy on the davit-guy.
Up, well up the fluke of her, and inboard haul!
  Well, ah, fare you well, for the Channel wind’s took hold of us,
   Choking down our voices as we ****** the gaskets free.
      And it’s blowing up for night,
      And she’s dropping light on light,
   And she’s snorting under bonnets for a breath of open sea,

Wheel, full and by; but she’ll smell her road alone to-night.
Sick she is and harbour-sick—Oh, sick to clear the land!
Roll down to Brest with the old Red Ensign over us—
Carry on and thrash her out with all she’ll stand!
  Well, ah, fare you well, and it’s Ushant slams the door on us,
   Whirling like a windmill through the ***** scud to lee:
         Till the last, last flicker goes
         From the tumbling water-rows,
      And we’re off to Mother Carey
      (Walk her down to Mother Carey!),
   Oh, we’re bound for Mother Carey where she feeds her chicks at sea!

I found I was left a mantle clock
The type that you wind by key,
It had stood upon my father’s shelf,
Now it came down to me.
Inside the clock I had found a note
Scrawled in my father’s hand,
‘You never must overwind the clock
For time is a shifting sand.’

That’s all that it said, that tiny note
And I’d wondered what he meant,
Surely he could have talked to me
And made it more evident.
But my father had been secretive
And never would say too much,
Just that his life had raced away
And left him behind, and such.

The end of his life had come too soon,
It certainly was a shock,
I found him sat alone in his chair
And pointing up at the clock,
It wasn’t until the afternoon
I noticed the clock had stopped,
Just as his heart had ceased to beat,
There wasn’t a tick, or tock.

I took it home and I placed it up
In pride of place on the shelf,
Over the wooden mantlepiece
And wound the thing up myself.
I just didn’t know how many times
I was meant to turn the key,
So probably over wound it then,
Not knowing what was to be.

Over the following week I found
The clock had been gaining time,
And thought, that’s probably what he meant,
Never to over wind,
I tried to adjust it back a bit
To change the rate of the pawl,
But found the cog was racing away
And speeding up overall.

No matter what I did to that clock
Its speed just wouldn’t be tamed,
I’d slow it down and it speeded up,
I felt I was being gamed,
But then I woke on a Wednesday and
I thought there was something strange,
The man on the news said ‘Thursday’,
Like the days had been rearranged.

The weeks and the months went flying by,
I still kept winding that clock,
Remembering how my father died,
I wouldn’t have dared to stop.
But then one day I forgot to wind
And it slowed, and took me aback,
I held the key, was about to wind
When I had my heart attack.

Luckily Joyce was in the room
Thank god for my lovely wife,
She seized the key and she wound it up
And probably saved my life.
I never forget to wind it now
That clock’s in sync with my heart,
But now my life is racing away
With the clock still playing its part.

David Lewis Paget

Fear and doubt flow directly through my veins freezing me into a chunk of solid ice,

Uncertainty forcefully drives a spike straight through my soft and thudding heart.

I want to speak but my tongue is sliced into pieces and fed right back down my throat.



The weight of isolation crushes my spirt flat against an endless sea of old concrete,

and true love and loyalty for my family and friends feels truly impossible to ever express.

Crude communication bumbles and kind fumbling gestures only push me away yet farther,

into a place distant as distant as my derelict father was to his motherless crying child.



Trickling thoughts whispers about the old familiar danger lurking within a lovely woman.

Repeated memories of abandonment burns fast as gunpowder inside my darkest hours,

and five stained cases became forever stuck in the lonesome cylinder left out in the rain to rust and was permanently welded shut.

I heard a boring, smelly rabbling
Dog - tormentor of my dreams
When I thought of the dog
Once upon a midnight dumb
'Dog!' said I, 'thing of hotdog.'
In a kingdom full of chum
'Dog!' chuckled I, 'Yes dog!'
I awoke and flung the pawl