They had a last supper, the day of the beaching,
she’s a dead ship sailing – skeleton crew.
The galley is empty, the stove pots are cooling,
with what’s left of a stew.

Her time is approaching, the captain moves over,
the hangman steps in, to do what he’s paid for.
With the wind and the tide, she goes proud ahead, steaming,
and he drives her hard into the shore.

So far from the Clyde,
together we’d ride,
we did ride.

As if to a wave, from her bows to her rudder,
bravely she rises, to meet with the land.
Under their feet, they all feel her keel shudder,
a shallow sea washes their hands.

Later, the captain shakes hands with the hangman,
and climbs, slowly, down to the oily wet ground.
Goes, bowed, to the car that has come here to take him,
through the graveyard and back to the town.

So far from the Clyde,
together we’d ride,
we did ride.

They pull out their cables and hack off her hatches.
Too poor to be wasteful with pity or time,
they swarm on her carcass with torches and axes,
like a whale on the bloody shoreline.

Stripped of her pillars, her stays and her stanchions.
When there’s only her bones on the wet, poisoned land,
steel ropes will drag her, with winches and engines,
’til there’s only a stain on the sand.

So far from the Clyde,
together we’d ride,
we did ride.