WAY BELOW THE TIDE
(Words and music; Colin Reece)

From the albums The Madmen of Gotham by The Bully Wee Band
and Way Below The Tide by Colin Reece

A song based on the belief in some parts of Scotland that seals can shed their seal skins and transform themselves into human form.
This is the story of a man who falls in love with one such creature, and then is forced to answer to her father when he discovers she is dying of a broken heart in her pining for him.

I think this is probably the favourite of my songs

I wait here with the waves and the wind in my ears

And wonder if she'll ever once again be by my side

I long to hear her song so soft across the waves to me

Though fate has bid that I must dwell on land

My heart lies way below the tide.

I scarce believed my eyes that night whilst walking on the sand

And still at times I wonder if it may have been a dream

One moment from the shoreline came a creature of the sea

The next there stood the loveliest of visions

Any man has ever seen.

To think on what I did then makes me hang my head in shame

I knew that if I took her coat she never could return

A cry of anguish broke her lips she fell down at my feet

I know I've never felt such pain or pity

Since the day that I was born.

"Oh take back your coat please believe I meant no harm.

To keep you here a prisoner of my passion would be wrong."

I swear for one brief second all the fear drained from her eyes

A flurry in the water, one last cry

And then my vision she was gone.

And oh then the night when her father did appear

Such a fine figured man I'm sure you never could have thought

His eyes left me doubtless that he'd seen all seven seas

But yet those same eyes could not hide

That there was trouble in his heart.

"Oh my daughter lies pained and I fear that she may die

And be it known I hate all men who live out of the sea

But I've learned she loves a man who has compassion in his heart

And though to beg your help it kills my pride,

My daughter's life means more to me."

"But I cannot see my daughter spend her lifetime here on land

One night in every nine is all my patience has to give

So if my daughter lives she will return here to your side

Ah but if she dies I promise I'll return

And you'll regret you ever lived."

So I wait here with the waves and the wind all in my ears

And wonder if she'll ever once again be by my side

I long to hear her song so soft across the waves to me

Though fate has bid that I should dwell on land

My heart lies way below the tide.