The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #148467 Message #3853163
Posted By: Jeri
30-Apr-17 - 06:10 PM
Thread Name: Sexual identity & trad folk music
Subject: RE: Sexual identity & trad folk music
There's also Short Jacket & White Trousers, with the lines:One night as she lay drowsing, she was ready for her bed,
Our captain heaved a sigh and said, "I wish you was a maid.
Your cherry cheeks and ruby lips they have beguiled me
And I've often wished with all my heart you could my sweetheart be."
"But hold your tongue, dear Captain, you know such talk's in vain,
For if our shipmates should come to hear they would make sport and game.
But when that we do go ashore some pretty girls we'll find
For to ramble along with us bold lads, seeing as you're that way inclined."
It's impossible to say if this person or the one Danny referred to in Willie o' Winsbury were saying that they understood those guy's appreciation by the opposite sex, or they were stating THEY felt that way, but that was the whole point. And in "Short Jacket", you can get bogged down in semantics. The beguiling happened when the captain believed the person was male.