Ipswich Ballad

On December Fifth,
says the Almanac,
Two Ipswich Men
went to Sea on a Haystack.

This was in Seventeen-
eighty-six.
Whatever got them
in such a fix

that they had to embark
on a wintry ocean?
What gave them the
Massachusetts notion

that Ipswich men
were so tough of gizzard
they could outsail
a northeast blizzard

with nothing beneath them
to keep them from death
but a pile of redtop
and clover breath?

What did they fashion
for mainsail or spinnaker?
Did they look backward
and say, “Gee whilliker!

Now we’ve done it!
There goes the town,
there go the dunes.
Let’s turn around

and steer toward the Indies.
Good-by, good wives!
We’ll have some peace
for once in our lives!”?

I’d like to ask
the Almanac
whether those mariners
ever came back

with spicy tales
in their flower-girt heads,
to horrify Ipswich,
and die in their beds.