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THE LAY OF THE LAST SIGNALMAN
On a thickly-wooded sponson, where the last projector stands;
The museum pair of hand-flags hanging idly in my hands,
With my jargon half-forgotten, of my stock-in-trade bereft,
I wonder what's ahead of me...the only bunting left.
The relics of my ancient craft have vanished one by one,
The cruiser arc, the Morse flag and maneuvering lights have gone,
And I hear they'd be as useless in the final global war,
As the hello, the foghorn, and the masthead semaphore.
The mast is sprouting gadgets like a nightmare Christmas tree,
There are whips and studs and waveguides, where my halyards used to be,
And I couldn't hoist a tackline through that lunatic array,
For at every height and angle there's a dipole in the way.
The alert and hawk-eyed signalman is rendered obsolete,
By the electrically operated optics of the fleet,
And the leaping barracuda or the charging submarine,
Can be sighted as a blob, upon a fluorescent screen.
To delete the human error, to erase a noble breed,
We rely upon a relay, and we pin our faith to creed,
So we press a button, make a switch, and spin a little wheel
And it's cent-per-cent efficient...when we're on an even keel.
But again I may be needed, for the time will surely come,
When we have to talk in silence, and the modern stuff is dumb,
When the signal lantern's flashing, or the flags are flying free...
It was good enough for Nelson, and it's good enough for me.
One of the reasons for my retirement is the Navy's decision that my specialty is no longer needed. This poem, written by a unknown (to me) signalman, covers my feelings very well.
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