Once I hoped for a long black train
to come and save me from all the strain
in the dead of night
before i was awake
it fled by heading south
silent and devout.
So days came and days went as i hoped for the train to come
round again, to pick me up and save me from what is bleak
this time it came roaring southward and i was awake,
but when i ran downstairs to catch this train
all the doors of my place were locked from the inside
and it headed on south,
my hope slain.
So I pitched camps for weeks right next to the old, rusty train tracks.
Tent in hand, no provision did I lack, tlil that long black train would come
and save me from the long black days.
But the train never came, so I gathered my tent and my things and headed home,
walking head down along the old, rusty train tracks.
Just then a man appeared next to me,
how he got there I haven’t a clue,
the only thing i knew was that he seemed kind,
and knew.
“What’s with the tent? Waiting for a long black train to save you from everything?”
the man said with a twinkle in his eye and a warm smile.
“Yes,’ I replied, “I thought that the train would take me South where all is gold
and tears don’t roll down the cheeks of its men, women, and children.”
“That’s a myth.” The man said. “I just came from down south and there was enough sorrow to go around.”
I was surprised. Everything I had been told about life in the south was that it was lovely and painless.
“Lovely and painless?” The man said, as though reading my mind. “That’s what the southerners say of the north. I just talked to a man from there years ago, he had pitched camp near the train track waiting for a long white train to take him north.”
A flash of deja vu came across me like a mist.
Then the man said, “I am pretty sure that man was you.”