Ashes Poetry

The Ballad of Sir Andrew Strauss

ALBION sits in doleful frown,
Drinking most of the time:
‘O whair O whair will I get a steely skipper
To sail this ship o’ mine.’

Up and spoke a bearded miller
Sat at the ECB,
’Sir Andrew Strauss is the best skipper
To sail against history.’

Albion quills broadest honour
To sign it for Angleland,
And duly messages Sir Andrew,
Doff’d caps, caps in hand.

The first line that Sir Andrew said
A calm ripple of delight
The next wave Sir Andrew read
turns ashen face bone white.

‘O what dark fates have done this deed,
This ill-deed done to me,
To send me out this time o’ year,
To skipper agin Eausea.’

‘Make haste, make haste, merry men all,
Our good ship sails the morn;
O say not say, my players dear,
I fear an Eausea storm.’

‘Late late yester’s day saw their team anew
Time as tide, their olden in their arms,
And I fear fear, my dear players
Shall succumb to succubus Eausea charms.’

O our hopes enobled were right loath’d
To scuff their heel high shoes,
But half o’er the play were play’d
Their baggy hats were sous’d.

O lang, lang may Eausea lads sit
Wi’ tinnies in their hand
Before they see Sir Andrew Strauss
Come a-sail to Angleland.

O lang, lang may these laddies stand,
gold roos dyed in their hair,
Waiting for their own dear lairds;
Who they’ll not see ne’er the mair.

Half o’er, half o’er to Australia,
‘Tis fully five bells deep,
And there resides good Sir Andrew Strauss
With the Eausea at his feet.

An early unpublished draft compilation by David Fine
Based on The Ballad of Sir Patrick Spens (version Percy’s Reliques, 1765, I, 71: “given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.”  b. Herd’s Scots Songs, 1769, p. 243. http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch058.htm )