In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who sings

Of the dreams that he brings from the wide open sea

In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who sleeps

While the river bank weeps to the old willow tree

In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who dies

Full of beer, full of cries in a drunken town fight

In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who's born

On a hot muggy morn by the dawn's early light

In the port of Amsterdam where the sailors all meet

There's a sailor who eats only fish heads and tails

And he'll show you his teeth that have rotted too soon

That can haul up the sails that can swallow the moon

And he yells to the cook with his arms open wide

"Hey, bring me more fish, throw it down by my side"

And he wants so to belch but he's too full to try

So he stands up and laughs and he zips up his fly

In the port of Amsterdam you can see sailors dance

Paunches bursting their pants grinding women to porch

They've forgotten the tune that their whiskey voice croaked

Splitting the night with the roar of their jokes

And they turn and they dance and they laugh and they lust

Till the rancid sound of the accordion bursts

And then out of the night with their pride in their pants

And the sluts that they tow underneath the street lamps

In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who drinks

And he drinks and he drinks and he drinks once again

He'll drink to the health of the whores of Amsterdam

Who've given their bodies to a thousand other men

Yeah, they've bargained their virtue, their goodness all gone

For a few dirty coins, well, he just can't go on

Throws his nose to the sky and he aims it up above

And he pisses like I cry on the unfaithful love

In the port of Amsterdam

In the port of Amsterdam