The Story Behind A Pirate's Eyes

 

Saturday, June 6, 2026, I'm sitting on my patio taking a break from yard work.

Like most afternoons, phone in my hand checking scores and wasting a few minutes before getting back to work.

 

Around me were dozens of signs I'd collected over the years. Tin signs, beer signs, man cave funny bar sayings.

The usual stuff.

 

But there was one sign that was different.

A circular pirate picture.

No words.

No brand.

No slogan.

Just a pirate.

 

 

 

Bought it about over 3 years ago and it finally

hung it on my wall about two years ago.

 

Looked at it hundreds of times and never thought much about it. It was just part of the décor.

 

Then something strange happened.

I looked up and the pirate looked different.

Not the hat .. Not the swords .. Not the skull.

 

The Eyes 

For some reason, they grabbed me.

They weren't angry.

They weren't wild.

They weren't cartoon pirate eyes.

They were cold .. Dark .. Unmovable.

 

The eyes of a man who had already accepted

whatever fate had waiting for him.

I stared at the picture for a few minutes and a phrase popped into my head.

 

A Pirate's Eyes.

 

The title came before a single lyric.

 

I immediately started thinking about a pirate song.

At first I went exactly where everybody goes.

Pirate ships, cannons, rum, treasure, sword fights.

All the usual pirate stuff.

The problem was that every verse sounded like

every other pirate song I'd ever heard.

 

So I kept rewriting .. And rewriting .. And rewriting.

Probably thirty times.

 

Started researching actual pirate terminology, old sailing language, naval warfare, sea legends, and pirate history.

 

Every time I thought I had the song finished, I'd find a better phrase or a stronger image.

Slowly, the song changed.

The swords became less important.

The treasure disappeared.

The pirate clichés started falling away.

The focus kept coming back to those eyes.

 

What would a sailor see when he looked across a deck and realized the pirate boarding his ship wasn't coming for gold?

 

What would a merchant captain see when he knew

there was no escape?

What would a dying man remember in his final moments?

The answer kept being the same.

A Pirates Eyes.

 

Everything began building around that single image.

I could hear the song in my head.

A slow stomping 4/4 beat.

Heavy and deliberate.

 

I wanted a sound like it was being sung

by a cursed crew at sea 

Male voices singing almost like a chant.

Uilleann pipes carrying a haunting melody underneath.

Not a cheerful sea shanty

Something older .. Darker.

 

Something that sounded like it had been sung in taverns

and harbours for a hundred years.

 

By the time I finished, almost everything

I started with was gone.

 

What remained was a song about fear.

About mortality.

About the reputation a pirate carried long before

he ever fired a cannon.

 

And all of it came from a simple moment

on a summer afternoon.

A break from yard work.

A glance away from my phone.

 

A picture I'd seen every day for two years.

And for the first time, it looked back.

 

With ... A Pirate's Eyes 

 

NKM