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 of Kankakee And rolls along past houses farms and fields Passing trains that have no name and freight yards full of old Black men And the graveyards full of rusted automobiles
Good morning, America, how are you? Say, don’t you know me? I’m your native son I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans And I’ll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Dealing cards with the old man in the club car Penny a point, ain’t no one keeping score Pass the paper bag that holds the bottle Feel the wheels rumbling ‘neath the floor And the sons of Pullman porters and the sons of engineers Ride their fathers’ magic carpet made of steel Mothers with their babes asleep, rocking to the gentle beat And the rhythm of the rails is all they feel
Good morning, America, how are you? Say, don’t you know me? I’m your 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
Night time 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 But all the towns and people seem to fade into a bad dream And the steel rails still ain’t heard the news The conductor sings his songs again, the passengers will please refrain This train has got the disappearing railroad blues
Good morning, America, how are you? Say, don’t you know me? I’m your 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