The City Of New Orleans

Riding on the City of New Orleans
Illinois Central Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders
Three conductors and twenty five sacks of mail
All along the Southbound odyssey
The train pulls out at Kankakee
Rolling past the houses farms and fields
Passing trains that have no name
Freight yards full of old black men
And the grave yards of the rusted automobiles

Singing good morning, America, how are ya?
Don'tcha know me I'm you're native son
I'm the train they call the City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done

Dealing card games with the old men in the club car
Penny a point ain't no one keeping score
Won'tcha pass the paper bag that holds the bottle
You can feel the wheels rumbling neath the floor
And the sons of pullman porters and the sons of engineers
Ride their father's magic carpet made of steel
Mother's with their babes asleep
Are rocking to the gentle beat
And the rhythm of the rails is all they feel

Singing good morning, America, how are ya?
Don'tcha know me I'm you're native son
I'm the train they call the City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done

Nighttime on the City of New Orleans
Changing cars in Memphis Tennessee
Halfway home we'll be there by morning
Through the Mississippi darkness
Rolling down to the sea
And all the towns and people seem to fade into a bad dream
And the steel rail still ain't heard the news
The conductor sings his song again
The passengers will please refrain
This train's got the disappearing railroad blues

Singing good morning, America, how are ya?
Don'tcha know me I'm you're native son
I'm the train they call the City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done