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Poets' Corner
A fabulous aerial view of the Manukau Harbour at low tide - source unknown
Eternal Father, Strong To Save
(The Sailors' Hymn)
written by William Whiting in 1860
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Onehunga Wharf
written by Bill Sewell in 1971
published in "The Ballad Of '51" by Bill Sewell in 2003
reproduced with permission by HeadworX Publishers
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Eternal Father, strong to save
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave
Who bidd'st the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep
Oh hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea
O Christ! Whose voice the waters heard
And hushed their raging at Thy word
Who walked'st on the foaming deep
And calm amidst its rage didst sleep
Oh hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea
Most Holy Spirit! Who didst brood
Upon the chaos dark and rude
And bid its angry tumult cease
And give, for wild confusion, peace
Oh hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea
O Trinity of love and power
Our brethren shield in danger's hour
From rock and tempest, fire and foe
Protect them wheresoe'er they go
Thus evermore shall rise to Thee
Glad hymns of praise from land and sea
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It was on the other harbour, the turbid one to the South,
the one that confounds sailors with the teeth at its mouth.
Canines at the entrance that snarl at you, "Watch out!",
and shallows stretching to Weymouth and navigation in doubt.
I'd drifted into the slack waters of January 'seventy-one,
needed money for the winter, couldn't sponge forever off the sun.
"There's work on the wharf", said Bryan, my enterprising friend.
"Come out to Onehunga. That's just what I intend".
So early the following morning, and only half-awake,
we hovered at the bus stop, two seagulls on the make.
Seagulls were casual labour, scavengers of the docks,
who swooped on any work that was going and otherwise manned the rocks.
Today two vessels were unloading, coasters, dirty to a fault:
"Puriri" and "Titoki", which smelt as always of diesel, cooking oil and salt.
With leather gloves and no instruction we climbed into the hold
heaved the sacks onto the pallets, whatever we were told.
The crane, it dipped and lifted, never needing any bait:
it hooked its catch out of the water, and landed it as freight.
The loads, they swung and dandled, threatened us above, below.
One came down before I was ready and put pressure on my toe.
There was shelter under the coaming when the sun became too hot.
We found there crates of beer to open that found the thirsty spot.
Put them down to breakage, to inevitable loss.
The cargo was ours for the taking, and buggeration to the boss.
And if things got a little arduous, every hour we would spell:
sprawled on bales in the goods shed we rested up pretty well.
Stoop money, dirt money, rain money, the historically hard-won fees:
even we, the disposable seagulls, were entitled to all of these.
And all the while the canines floated, a reminder in the West;
and the economy ebbed and flooded, and no-one worried in the least.
Ah, those summer days at Onehunga, easy days of my youth,
twenty years on from the confrontation, and as far away from the truth.
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