Two Years Before The Mast

[Hook] Two years spent before the mast And no one knows the secrets that we're hiding If word got loose, you'd face the lash And thirteen loops would hold me fast and silent Things are not always as they seem to be, outside us The Devil got poor Persephone, but they can't take you from me [Verse 1] Mr. Jones done made a mistake; it's all business Worse thing than the watery grave with Porichthys I found her behind a barrel of grain in the hold, listless A hollow, half hatter, dismayed, frayed princess But I guess I've gone soft in my age, they call it instinct The rebels get the devil to pay her the cat kissing The gunner's daughter; know I oughta send her to the brig But the strongest knots still give in still water and calm winds And all things aren't what they seem to be in That small wall separating Earth from Eden One rib did give Eve a meaning And one snip might could keep a secret With her short hair there and a change of clothing Fit right and work soaking oakum And in four fortnights, she'll unload with the opium And might slip by buffer and boatswain [Hook] Two years spent before the mast And no one knows the secrets that we're hiding If word got loose, you'd face the lash And thirteen loops would hold me fast and silent Things are not always as they seem to be, outside us The Devil got poor Persephone, but they can't take you from me [Bridge] With every snip of the shears A fist of her hair took to the air handsomely 'Til it floated down among the the clouds Reflected on the glassy sea When the winds disappeared, the crew stripped Almost bare, and bathed in a transfixed state And all things are what they seem to be As she floated next to me, just out of reach [Verse 2] There is no knot so steadfast, it won't go broke in the middle of monsoons You don't show, waiting, watching -- her wet lips and clothes soaked through Her blinded mind to the red sky and oxide clouds Living just as a phasmid amidst lines and booms Coupled up with abstinence and stolen looks We broke our pledge against the bulkhead, and the world pitchpoled Now Mr. Jones was a poor soul who walked into a tempest Endlessly tying two poor fools A victim of the whipping when headsail floats footloose The best men can end when a storm rolls through So we paid our keep for the sin of a reckless dream In the seam where secrets sleep Between me, her, the Devil and the deep blue sea [Hook] Two years spent before the mast And no one knows the secrets that we're hiding If word got loose, you'd face the lash And thirteen loops would hold me fast and silent Things are not always as they seem to be, outside us The Devil got poor Persephone, but they can't take you from me