Dogtown
Words and Music by Harry Chapin

Up in Massachusetts there's a little spit of land 
The men who make the maps, yes they call the place Cape Anne 
The men who do the fishing call it Gloucester Harbor Sound 
But the women left behind, they call the place Dogtown

The men go out for whaling past the breakers and the fogs 
The women stay home waiting, they're protected by the dogs 
A tough old whaler woman who had seen three husbands drown 
Polled the population and she named the place Dogtown 

There's all these grey faced women in their black widow's gowns 
Living in this graveyard granite town 
You soon learn there's many more than one way to drown 
That's while going to the dogs, here in Dogtown

And she speaks... 
My father was a merchant all in the Boston Fife 
When my husband came and asked him for my hand 
But little did I know then that a Gloucester Whaler's wife 
Marries but the sea salt and the sand

He took me up to Dogtown the day I was a bride 
We had ten days together before he left my side 
He's the first mate on a whaling ship, the keeper of the log 
He said, "Farewell my darling, I'm gonna leave you    with my dog." 

And I have seen the splintered timbers of a hundred shattered hulls 
Known the silence of the granite and the screeching of the gulls 
I've heard that crazy Widow Cather walk the harbor as she raves 
At the endless rolling whisper of the waves

Sitting by the fireside, the embers slowly die 
Is it a sign of weakness when a woman wants to cry 
The dog is closely watching, the fire glints in his eye 
No use to go to sleep this early, no use to even try

My blood beats like a woman's, I've got a woman's breasts and thighs 
But where am I to offer them, to the ocean or the skies? 
Living with this silent dog all the moments of my life 
He has been my only husband, am I a widow,    or his wife? 

dog town 
And it's a fog town 
And there's nothing around 
'Cept the sea pounding granite ground 
And this black, midnight horror of a hound

I'm standing on this craggy cliff, my eyes fixed on the sea 
Six months past when his ship was due, I'm a widow-to-be
For liking this half-living with the lonely and the fog
You need the bastard of the mating of a woman and a dog

And I have seen the splintered timbers of a hundred shattered hulls 
Known the silence of the granite and the screeching of the gulls 
I've heard that crazy Widow Cather walk the harbor as she raves 
At the endless rolling whisper of the waves