A Space Chantie for Tom Corbett, Space Cadet (based on the original ballad Gentleman Sailors)
Revised Words (C) 1997 by Dansen T. Stahl
We have studied Navigation, Atomics, and
Higher Math,
planetary orbits and cometary paths.
We have learned to integrate, plotenate, dead reckonate
with little Bradley Thompson's prismic grate.
We can find the strains and grooves
in the 'tomic engine tubes.
And we know the difference 'twixt strut and tee.
And we're taught to see, by analogy,
the likeness of pump, tube, and batt'ry.
Chorus:
We're poor little Mids who have lost our
way.
Bah! Bah! Bah!
Cruising far out by Jupiter way.
Bah! Bah! Bah!
Gentlemen spacers from planets three
bound to Hell for eternity.
God have pity on such as we!
Bah! Bah! Bah!
Oh, this life in the Big Empty is an endless
joy for me
I arise at 6:00 A.M. to start a day again
and, still dreaming of my girl, my hammock quickly do I furl.
Then quickly do I dress and hurry off to mess.
I can navigate a ship, take parallax and
dip.
Refraction always seemed to me a pip.
I can steer a course, n'er a pelt, through the Asteroid Belt
and never miss my fix with the stars of 'Rion's Belt.
I can name for you each star and can tell you just how far
each planet is from us or from the sun.
I can take an azimuth and at time-sights make a bluff --
Navigation's of them all the simplest one.