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From “Volunteers” Tom Shelley, Virginia
I WAS born in Ireland, | |
| I’ve been in every country of the world, | |
| I am an American citizen seventeen years, | |
| I’m only thirty-nine years old; | |
| And yet, in spite of all that, | 5 |
| The army won’t enlist me as a soldier | |
| For the great war. | |
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| I’ve been a sailor over twelve years, | |
| And can tell about the building of ships— | |
| Ever since the first one was made | 10 |
| Of the hollow of a tree. | |
| And still they won’t take me in— | |
| This war is hard on me. | |
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| I can teach how to cut a dug-out canoe, | |
| Or stretch one of skins; | 15 |
| I’ve sailed in a reed raft off Australia, | |
| And in the surf boats of Madras; | |
| I can help to build ships, | |
| And explain how the keel of a vessel | |
| Is only the old log minus the dugout. | 20 |
| Ask me why the fo’castle of old Egyptian ships | |
| Was shaped up into a neck-like thing, | |
| And finished off into the figure of a bird, | |
| Or a beast?— | |
| It was religion; that’s what it was. | 25 |
| I can tell all that, | |
| And yet they won’t enlist me. | |
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| I can talk about paddle propulsion, galley oars, | |
| Sail, steam and oil; | |
| And there’s not a splice, eye-splice, chain-splice, | 30 |
| Or rigging shroud that I don’t know. | |
| I’ve a union card too, | |
| And yet I can’t make a hit. | |
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| I’ve been wrecked off the Brazilian coast, | |
| Where the bay of the Amazon looks like another ocean, | 35 |
| And off the east coast of Ireland too, | |
| Almost in sight of the rocks of Holyhead; | |
| I know what sea power is, and that no man or nation | |
| Will ever command the waves, for sea power | |
| Is not from guns, but from winds. | 40 |
| I know everything I’ve said, | |
| And yet I can’t get a show. | |
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| They take these young fellows— | |
| Why can’t I enlist too? | |
| I can do more, and I know more, | 45 |
| And I can stand more and fight more | |
| In a day than any of them. | |
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