• We are two mariners
    Our ships' sole survivors
    In this belly of a whale

    Its ribs our ceiling beams
    Its guts our carpeting
    I guess we have some time to kill

    You may not remember me
    I was a child of three
    And you, a lad of eighteen

    But I remember you
    And I will relate to you
    How our histories interweave

    At the time you were
    A rake and a roustabout
    Spending all your money
    On the whores and hounds

    You had a charming air
    All cheap and debonair
    My widowed mother found so sweet

    And so she took you in
    Her sheets still warm with him
    Now filled with filth and foul disease

    As time wore on you proved
    A debt-ridden drunken mess
    Leaving my mother
    A poor consumptive wretch

    And then you disappeared
    Your gambling arrears
    The only thing you left behind

    And then the magistrate
    Reclaimed our small estate
    And my poor mother lost her mind

    Then one day, in spring
    My dear sweet mother died
    But before she did
    I took her hand as she, dying, cried:
    Oh Ohhhhh

    "Find him, bind him
    Tie him to a pole and break
    His fingers to splinters
    Drag him to a hole until he
    Wakes up naked
    Clawing at the ceiling
    Of his grave
    *sigh*"

    It took me fifteen years
    To swallow all my tears
    Among the urchins in the street

    Until a priory
    Took pity and hired me
    To keep their vestry nice and neat

    But never once in the employ
    Of these holy men
    Did I ever, once, turn my mind
    From the thought of revenge

    One night I overheard
    The prior exchanging words
    With a penitent whaler from the sea

    The captain of his ship
    Who matched you toe to tip
    Was known for a wanton cruelty

    The following day
    I shipped to sea
    With a privateer

    And in the whistle
    Of the wind
    I could almost hear...

    "Find him, bind him
    Tie him to a pole and break
    His fingers to splinters
    Drag him to a hole until he
    Wakes up naked
    Clawing at the ceiling
    Of his grave

    "There is one thing I must say to you
    As you sail across the sea
    Always, your mother will watch over you
    As you avenge this wicked deed"

    And then that fateful night
    We had you in our sight
    After twenty months at sea

    Your starboard flank abeam
    I was getting my muskets clean
    When came this rumbling from beneath

    The ocean shook
    The sky went black
    And the captain quailed

    And before us grew
    The angry jaws
    Of a giant whale


    oh ohhhhhhhhhh
    [screaming]
    ohhhhh
    [screaming]

    Don't know how I survived
    The crew all was chewed alive
    I must have slipped between his teeth

    But, oh! What providence!
    What divine intelligence!
    That you should survive
    As well as me

    It gives my heart
    Great joy
    To see your eyes fill with fear

    So lean in close
    And I will whisper
    The last words you'll hear