A Life on the Ocean Wave lyrics (1838) music by Henry Russell, lyrics by Epes Sargent, the official march of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, performed in Ship Ahoy
A life on the ocean wave,
A-home on the rolling deep!
Where the scater’d waters rave,
And the winds their revels keep.
Like an eagle caged I pine
On this dull, unchanging shore.
Oh give me the flashing brine,
The spray and the tempest’s roar.
Chorus:
A life on the ocean wave,
A-home on the rolling deep!
Where the scater’d waters rave
And the winds their revels keep,
The winds, the winds …
The winds their revels — keep.
Once more on the deck I stand,
Of my own swift, gliding craft.
Set sail, farewell to land,
The gale follows fair abaft.
We shoot thro’ the sparkling foam,
Like an ocean bird set free.
Like the ocean bird, our home,
We’ll find far out on the sea.
Chorus:
The land is no longer in view,
The clouds have begun to frown.
But with a stout vessel and crew,
We’ll say : Let the storm come down!
And the song of our heart shall be,
While the winds and waters lave:
A life on the heaving sea,
A-home on the bounding wave!
Chorus: