Last Train

[bluduc]

This started out as a song and quickly became a short story. So now it's just a poem. I was driving by a abandon depot and reflected back to a time when the passenger train was a booming industry in the US. Of course we know all good things must end. But the memories still remain.

 

 

 

                                 The Last Train

 

 

That hot Texas sun sends red ants running back to their holes there in the sand

The local crowd starts breaking up and most are heading back to their homes and ceiling fans

The marching bands finished playing and the depot doors and windows are locked and chained

Today they waved goodbye and said so long to the Last Train

 

99 degrees and rising reads the sign there on the bank

Theres a crack of footsteps walking on a squeaky white oak plank

Conversation breaks the silence as he slides his watch back into his coat

Wipes  his face with a red bandana and softly clearers his throat.

 

He says Son I started working at that depot in the fall of 1924

Selling tickets, tot-en baggage, mopping restrooms and waxing floors

Worked my way up to short run switchman and then the big day came

They made me depot master got the keys and this gold pocket watch and chain

 

Now times were a whole lot different then, cause back then, now that was a time

The country was growing up and a dime was still worth a dime

That old cotton gin she was ginning new folks started moving in

Why at one time boy we had 200 head of cattle standing right there in that cattle pen

 

It was the winter of 34 dec third I sure remember that day well

This pretty lady from Atlanta come storming in and she was raising holy hell

She said we lost her baggage in Texarkana and lost her favorite gingham dress

I didn’t know it then son but soon she would become your great grandma Ida Bess

 

We were married right there on that platform 1936 was the fifteenth day of June

Took the 12:18 to Galveston where we spent a two week honeymoon

I wish you could have known her son, she was my whole wide world it seemed

She sure was more than this old railroad fool could ever made up in a dream

 

Now in the fall of 42 there was this talk of some kind of fever going round

Ida Bess fell sick and died and we buried her in that cemetery you know the one out south of town

And I was left with two stapling boys your grandpa Bill and his brother Sam

Sam joined the Marine Corp and made Captain, but he died over there in Bataan

 

They sent me back his body he came in on the 2:49

At the funeral there was way over a hundred mourners standing in that funeral line

They put the flag , the flag there on his casket , played Taps had a 21 gun salute

We laid him down beside his mama, in his marine corp captain suit

 

Now in the 50s we saw better times there was peace around the world

Your grandpa Bill got married in 52 and in 54 they had a little baby girl

Now she was something else her name was Sue, but I called her Goldie Locks

With those big blue eyes and dimples she could have charmed to Devil right out of his fiery socks

 

 

 

Now Bill would bring her down here to the depot and she would get into everything                                                                 She’d pull out this pocket watch and say hay mister when the next train

Then she would hear that whistle and those blue eyes would get bigger than a silver dollar

Then she’d run out there on that platform and wait to hear that old porter holler

 

All abroad Fort Worth, Dallas, Texarkana, 5 minuets fore we leave

Watch your step young lady, I’ll take that bag sir, dinning in the rear car, check that ticket please

Then she’d run back in the station and jump up on that ledge you know the one there in the back

Put her little nose up against the window pane and watch the train roll off down the track

 

Now the 60’s brought troubled times with that crazy war over in Vietnam

People were taking different side I guess I never knew which side to make a stand

Those young boys would come through here boosting bout the war and how they were gonna to win

But like most wars there were so many that never came back home again

 

Now that little girl grew up so fast and in the summer of 74 I believe that was the year

She ran off up to Dallas and got married to a railroad engineer

They moved back here and settled down and were as happy as anyone could expect

He was working the south bound late night run and we got the call there had be a wreck

 

Well we waited up together all night just waiting for some kind of news

But I had seen this happen so many times before and deep down  well I knew

I held her in my arms, and we both prayed, and I dried her eyes while she cried

And then the call came in and they said that both the brakeman and the engineer had died

 

Now six months later a little blond haired boy was born the spitting image of his dad

And that little boy was you son and thats why I tried hard to be the dad you never had

Now why are we standing here son, shoot we got lot’s of stuff to do

There went the last train and i’m out of a job and wasn't today your last day of school

 

You know Iv’e got a box full up of fishing gear, two cane poles and a pound of chicken liver

And I saw a whole bunch of big old cat fish rolling round last time I was down there at river

 

Those red ants they go running to their holes back in the sand

A little freckled fingers reach up and grab a weathered calloused hand

As they head on down the sidewalk he turns and for just for a moment he looks back

He whispers 93 years that old depots stood and then his eyes turn toward the track

 

Then he say’s boy you know the fishing gonna be great today cause it’s way to hot to rain

Then they shuffle on off down the street and today, today was the last train.

Edited January 12, 2014 by bluduc

[emmy33]

O.o

[bluduc]

O.o

What does this mean? I take it you are saying it sucks big time and it sucks small time. Please elaborate if you would. I truly want you opinion. I posted this for input. Thank you.

[Kenj]

I like it.  Showing and not telling for the most part.  A reflection of the real world from a real person.  Understand about things changing their medium on you.  I'm trying to write an opera which I had been trying to write as a graphic novel and which started out as a big black prose notebook.  Can't draw and I don't sing too good either

[bluduc]

I like it.  Showing and not telling for the most part.  A reflection of the real world from a real person.  Understand about things changing their medium on you.  I'm trying to write an opera which I had been trying to write as a graphic novel and which started out as a big black prose notebook.  Can't draw and I don't sing too good either

Thanks for the response. I do have a habit of letting simple thing get out of hand. As I stated this started out to be a song and my co-writer, the heart side of my brain keep writing no matter what I did to stop him. I am working on a video with just narration of the words with a slide show with old black and white photos using the ken burns effect to tell the story. Background with train whistles and sound of a train rolling down the track and little sounds of people and footsteps to accent the events of the photos. I will post soon. Wow, writhing a opera now that sounds like a real challenge. As far as the graphics, google images is unbelievably full of royalty free stuff of every thing imaginable. I have spent 60 years trying to get the singing thing down and still not there. As Dirty Harry said" A man must know his limitations". LOL. Thanks again for the support.

Frank