Malvina
Reynolds: Song Lyrics and Poems
Puget Boat Song
Notes: words and music
by Malvina Reynolds; copyright 1974 Schroder Music Company, renewed 2002.
Malvina and her husband Bud spent the summer of 1953 on a boat owned by
a friend who was something less than competent as a sea captain. This
song paints an idyllic picture--“Log of the Echo III” tells the real story.
I don't care if we never get back to shore
Anymore,
I don't care if we never get where
We're supposed to be headed for,
The sea is dancing, the weather is fair,
Tar on my feet and wind in my hair,
I don't care if we never get there,
We'll just keep moving around,
Sailing the Sound.
Days are long cause we're getting up towards the Pole,
There's a goal!
She's got a bone in her teeth, don't hold her in,
Let her ride and roll,
Days are long and nights are a dream,
We can fish and eat berries and cream,
Drift with the tide or put her upstream,
Oh we'll be found,
Somewhere on the Sound.
No one cares if we hurry or take it slow,
As we go.
Make her fast to a boom at night
While the stars go by in a row.
In the morning we'll be under way,
Princess Louisa or Buccaneer Bay,
Inland passage to Sitka, say,
Or Nome.
Just only not home.
The farther we go, the wider and cleaner the sky,
Mountain high,
The gulls that wheel and the herons that cry
Are not more happy than I.
The port is friendly, the people are rare,
But I don't care if we never get there,
Let's keep going to any old where,
Northward bound,
Out of the Sound.