The Bird the Sailors Knew (Booby (reprise))

Lyrics

The booby on the cliff doesn't blink.
It watches the coracle. It watches me.
It doesn't know about the iron pot.
It doesn't remember the other name they had.

On the deck of the HMS Beagle, in 1835,
they called them 'booby mutton'.
Because they were like sheep.
You could just walk up and take one by the wing.
No fear.
Charles Darwin wrote it down.
A sailor with a gaff hook,
a late afternoon before the dog watch.
The sun was hot and sticky on the skin.

The bird the sailors knew was supper.
A greasy tang of something fresh.
The bird I know is just my neighbor.
Here on the cliff, we watch the sea.
Pemba says they are protected now.
And we do not eat the boobies.

The ship's cook had an iron pot.
He'd drop the meat in with salt pork
and the last of the ship's biscuit.
The smell was briny, oily,
a welcome change, they wrote in the log,
from the monotony of salt provisions.
After weeks of nothing but brine and wind.
A hot meal under a sweltering sky.

The bird the sailors knew was supper.
A greasy tang of something fresh.
The bird I know is just my neighbor.
Here on the cliff, we watch the sea.
Pemba says they are protected now.
And we do not eat the boobies.

Kiki says their bones are hollow.
For flight.
He says the sailors needed the calories.
To hoist the sails, to climb the ropes.
I think about their hollow bones
boiling in the pot.
I think about their trusting eyes.

The booby on the cliff is still there.
It tucks its head under its wing.
It doesn't know I know its story.
It trusts the world. It trusts the rock.
Kiki and I, we just watch.
We leave a little fish for it sometimes.
And we go home.