Union Songs

Song of the West Coast Seamen

A poem by Merv Lilley©Merv Lilley 1963

"My own true love, my darling,
Why have you gone from me?"
"To fire a greasy cattle boat
Across the bounding sea.

From Darwin to Fremantle
With the white tide running free,
They've made me union delegate
Upon the 'Kabb-ar-lee.'

From Derby to Fremantle
Where the cattle boats all go,
They've made me union delegate
Upon the 'Dorrigo.'

My little love, my darling,
I am a union man.
We face the court and companies
With strike and fight and ban,
And you'll have to live on shore alone
In the best way that you can."

"My own true love, my darling,
When will you come to me,
To sit beside the chimney piece
With your head against my knee?

There's winter in the wind tonight
And all the seas make moan,
True lovers lie in bed, asleep,
But we two lie alone."

"From Darwin to Fremantle
With the white tide running free,
They've made me union delegate
Upon the 'Kabb-ar-lee.'

From Derby to Fremantle
Where the cattle boats all go,
They've made me union delegate
Upon the 'Dorrigo.'

Notes

Many thanks to Merv Lilley for permission to add this poem to the Union Songs collection. It was published in What About The People a collection of poems by Dorothy Hewett and Merv Lilley published by the National Council of the Realist Writers in 1963

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union songs..........a selection by mark gregory