Southwest Chief

Leaving Chicago on the Southwest Chief

Past the old brick buildings on bootleggers' streets

At the back of the train in the cold Midwest wind

I hear her engine howl and I feel alive again

Southwest Chief, let your whistle blow

Wherever you're heading, I wanna go

Racing through cornfields and nameless small towns

Porch lights coming on as the sun's going down

And folks I've known and loved keep crossing my mind

As the Chief keeps on pushing and making up lost time

And I remember my friend Bill Morrissey

We were gonna write a song but that never came to be

"Make it a blues," he said, "sweet, tough and sincere

'Cause we only come around once and then we disappear"

Southwest Chief, let your whistle blow

Wherever you're heading, I wanna go

Kansas City has lightning, Colorado has rain

The simple things in life are so hard to explain

Like your lover's voice whispering your name

Or a prairie sunrise from the back of a train

The hills of Santa Fe are dusted with snow

And Spirit stands above the land of the Navajo

So I say an old prayer that I learned as a child

About the hopeless, the helpless, the damned and the wild

Southwest Chief, let your whistle blow

Wherever you're heading, I wanna go

Days from Chicago on the Southwest Chief

Riding steel wheels and searching for some peace

Crossing the Mojave, coyotes running by

Then through the mountains where the condors still fly

Soon freeways and tract homes are all that I can see

So I close my eyes and think about what the future might be

The conductor hollers, "It's the end of the line"

But I think I'll stay right here and ride you one more time

Southwest Chief, let your whistle blow

Wherever you're heading, I wanna go

Southwest Chief, let your whistle blow

Wherever you're heading, I'm gonna go