Marie

In Several Keys     We hear the opening refrain,     Marie!     We thought so; here you are again,     Marie!     A simple tune, in simple thirds,     Beloved of after-dinner birds;     A legend, self-condemned as 'words,'     Marie!     She lingers by the flowing tide,     Marie;     A 'fisher-lad' is close beside     Marie;     He gazes in her 'eyes so blue';     Marie, Marie, my heart is true;     And then, - you do, you know you do,     Marie! -     But vain is every mortal wish,     Marie;     And 'fisher-lads' have got to fish,     Marie;     O blinding tears! O cheeks 'so' wet!     Marie, I come again! And yet     I shouldn't feel disposed to bet,     Marie!     A tempest drives across the wave,     Marie;     With triplets in the treble stave,     Marie;     The player pounds. With bulging eyes     Th' excited vocalist replies;     The maddened octaves drown his cries,     Marie!     The storm is past. We hear again,     Marie,     The simple thirds, the waltz refrain,     Marie;     We only see some drifting wrack,     An empty bunk, a battered smack,     Alas! Alas!! Alack!!! Alack!!!!     Marie!     O good old words, O 'tears that rise,'     Marie!     O good young fisher-lad that dies,     Marie!     We leave you on the lonely shore; -     You wave your hands for evermore,     A bleak, disgusted semaphore,     Marie!