There’s a fisherman’s wharf
Down in Malpeque Bay
Filled with lobster traps
And boating decay

Though the waters seem calm
And the red sand flows gently in the waves
I can’t help but think about
The fishermen on their way

Out to the open arms and the rocky drift
Of the St. Lawrence Gulf
To bring back the summer’s catch
Of sea creatures untouched by the gulls

And in their travels I wonder what they think about
Maybe a wife, or a child, or a mother
Do they worry that they’ll never return
And be known to the world as another lost brother

Are they bound to the sea by visiting her
Through storms and cold weather
Does she call them back to the currents
Like the wind commands a feather

The fisherman’s curse, they say
Is the grip of Neptune’s hand
On their rubber boot ankles
That forbids them from dying on land

The part that makes me somber
Is the sea always calls them too young
And she aids in calling the waves
To bring the men a salty mouth to which remains unsung

The graves of the fishermen line the shores
But not in Malpeque Bay
No I see them in Placentia
A fishing town most burgeon in May

And I see the engravings
Most “drowned at sea”
Well if I ever wander
I wonder if I will be

So I stand at the shoreline
Watching the tide slowly roll in
I see the shipwrecked souls
Of those who failed to swim

Though I doubt they put up much of a fight
When the gulf said it was time
The captain goes down with his ship
Damned to the watery hell of a victimless crime

This is the fisherman’s wharf
Surrounded by blue sky and whitecap waves
With the smells of ocean spray and sea foam
And lined by fisherman’s graves