Last Train Running

Last Train Runnin’ For Bob Dylan The nickel-plated moon howled outside my window like a bullet missing from its sleeve A lyric tore through the autumn wind on a smokestack through the trees Like a ghost that whispers metaphors and won’t tell you what they mean It fades into a whisper while you’re stuck with what you’ve seen It was a song about a storyteller with a verse about the past Hung long inside my restless mind and hid in shadows cast The metal grinding six-string guitar like wheels on the tracks A songster told of flights and journeys playin’ down the facts I rose so slow from my humid sleep sat stone still on the bed I just let that smokestack lightning ring inside my head That blues harp whistle horizon deep, rumbled, then it rolled Like that midnight hour at crossroads’ edge Robert Johnson lost his soul I heard union men and the coal-black din of ******* on the road Capos working a child to death, and never payin’ what they owed I heard a folksinger storyteller whisper dreams inside his sleep Hand out lighting from a whisky bottle with lyrics meant to keep Its melody was awful sweet as that train rode through the dark And the music from that locomotive left these visions on my heart I saw lonesome hobos warm their hands saw travelin’ roads-men too Saw Mississippi John leaving home before his song was through Now that singing storyteller made me rise and through my window peer I loved the sound that whistle made, the music I could hear I looked through the high lonesome sound that made that whistle cry I saw a train on the edge of midnight, I saw Woody Guthrie wave goodbye