Gladstone Pier

歌詞

Peter was a sailor Swarthy lean and proud He could take a schooner through a big sea swell Aloof in the mainland crowd She loved his quiet laughter Like a boy he'd shrug and grin The beach stretched wide at Port Mackay With dreams upon the wind He wore her name in a rose tattoo Long weekends of gins and lime She lived in Cairns, made plans to move Checkout girl part-time And rumour said, "There's a boom ahead, You can make your future here By the Gladstone Pier" A two-roomed fibro shelter Empty hopes, the damp, the flies Prices hiked, her face grew tight And conversation died And the foreman at the smelter said "You're much too old Try the canefields furthers north" And the clerk at the market said "We don't buy trouble There's a strike down at the port" Then a six-day shift in a filthy pit The drag lines gouging coal The black dust gnaws at your lungs and pores And the anger rots your soul And the queue round the block waits for you to drop Can you take it for another year? By the Gladstone Pier Every Sunday he'd walk alone Casting pebbles at the passing waves Plunge in brine, cleanse his pride And a stronger man remains The crunch of shale and distant sails Ached within his bones Seeing ships upon the tide Bound for ports unknown Soon he drank for comfort She grew bitter in the weeks between The nights of beer and hollow cheer When love became routine They fought, she left him crying Angry words in a last café In desperation on a lonely night She took the bus to Cairns next day Gladstone couples break that way Mutual blame and no regrets Boomtown blues just fade to grey And all that's left are debts - He cried, "I've got to leave this dirty old town and the rattle of broken men Break these chains, wash the pain And put to sea again I drained all my passion, my anger and my fears And sank them in a flagon under Gladstone Pier" She saw him through the Greyhound window As the dawn glowed on the chrome Standing by the pier under sullen skies Sea winds calling home From Surfers up to Townsville Past the high-rise colonies Fast food, cheap motels And two more boomtown refugees