Train talk

 Tickets and rail cards

Anymore refreshments

Going to hayford

Lots of them go up and down

Got him a dog

Found him in the garden

I said the garden! Not on a farm!? 

In the gazebo

In the gazebo! 

His names Kenny

We've got a Milo

That figures

Sky train

 

Oh I'm on a sky train with you

And we are rolling over the blue

So happy to be on a sky train with you

Nothing's going on in my brain

The streets pass by in the rain

I'm happy as can be, it is true

When I'm on a sky train with you

Whistle stop

 South bound whistle

On a northbound train

You better get on the chance won't come again

Living in the breathing moment

Don't stand on the platform 

For your train will run passed

There's no use holding onto

The ghosts of the past

Here we come on the strawberry line

We slash and we hack

Beat a path down the track

But there's no use in regretting

We never look back

Here we come

On the train called now

Oh the wheels are turning and it's never the same

The platform you get on at will not come again

The wheels squeal engines throb

However you feel you finish the job,

When the whistle blows we'll be getting on the train

Here we come, hear us coming the chance won't come again

And the steam billows out through the tunnel dark

You might try to out run it but it's lit in you a spark

But time's train is gonna follow whether you do or not

Just keep moving forward through the blind spot

Here we come, hear us coming

Jonny the train driver

 Jonny was a steam Engine driver

He knew his way around like a spider

Through dark tunnels

He would ride her

Oh Jonny you won't ride no more

Lay down that old track

Don't stop to sleep, don't look back

Rest will come when you're off the clock 

Jonny you've still got a long long way to ride

That steam train whistle's gonna find ya

On your back lying with the sleepers they will bind ya

But you didn't see something black move like a creeper

Snake bit Jonny like the grim reaper

Oh Jonny come back down the tunnel

Jonny, Jonny

Oh Jonny come down the tunnel again

On your slow steam train

On your slow steam train

Jonny come round again

Jonny saw the shadow of an eagle

Come down out the sky, it wasn't legal

And on his ankle lay a beagle

But he'll never ride the train again

Lay down that steam train track

Lay down the sleepers on their backs

Come make it narrow gauge

Just pay him his darn wage

He's got smoke in his eyes turning black

So lay down your pick and your axe

Lay down your word and your tax

We've paid you enough

With our blood and toil it was tough

And you sure didn't help with throwing jacks 

Lay down your spade and your ace

We can't dig your maid and her face

She's carrying a water bucket through tunnel hill

That's the place that she came when Jack met Jill

It's about the journey not the destination

 Clink clang

shh shh

Clink clang shh shh shh

shh shh shh shh

Can you hear us coming

Working round the bend

Pick axes cracking stone

Clearing debris in the den

Shh shh, shh-shh

Hush and listen a while

Hear the sound the ground makes

It will make you smile

Sh-shh, shh-shh, like voices at the station

Ghost passengers waiting for their locomotion

Slash slash at station Rd

Bells ring out on Hitchin lane

Sh-shh, shh-shh, clang clang

As hammer on iron rang

Steaming through the tunnel

At Mendip Vale

I can hear the ghost train coming

pale rider, pale

Shh-shh, shh-shh

Then the signal man

Let his flag down

The Beeching cuts began, 

slash slash

Slash, slash we go with billhooks

All these years later

Read about steam trains in history books

Slash, slash go the hedge layers

Bending down the trunks

Laying down the cycle path on old rocky bunks

Clearing the valley floor of debris and junk

Heave ho, heave ho, hand over hand

Passing up the rumble, clear through station stands

Coming under Cannard's grave

Clearing through the sidings

Picking up the thread near Mill lane

Dungeon farm and keep winding

Shh-shh, shh-shh, what's that I hear?

Not the sound of clanging metal

But the sounds of changing gear

Children's voices laughing

Families pedalling for joy

Laying down the cycle pathing

Steam train whistle sounds like a child's toy

Toot-toot

The racing and the Whirring

Faster now, faster still

shh-shh -shh, shh-shh-shh

We're steaming up the hill

Our legs are the crank shafts

The pistons pumping blood

Our boilers filled with sandwiches

As we go riding through the mud

Picking up the trail 

Just near the Dinder Quarry

Then out under Dulcote

Early or late you needn't hurry

There's just the stars in the night sky

That make up the constellations

Just like the lights of the past don't die

All along the Strawberry line stations

Railway silence

 The ducks on the sharp pond

The eye of the ice

The glittering tear lake

There bitterns shy twice

And Egrets and Herons

Stalk upon the fronds

Crushing and stealing

The icing on the cake

The glittering tear lake

Where blue sky cries

Into the fears and mistaken

Lullabies

Out shoot the swallows and in the branches starlings twitter

All above the glitter

Of the glitterati lake

Come see the birds swoon in their dazzling displays

Play fiddler on the roof tunes

As we walk the golden highway

And the yellow brick road shines

But there's no way we can stay

As I see the Tin man from Japan

Pick up his bucket and spade

And the black lion roars in the railway sidings

And his iron coat soars

And his bronze mane shining

Like a Sun pirate coruscated

and laid out on the plain

Dorothy is skipping doing a dance for the rain

And I'm on the platform waiting for the last train

But it left several hours ago, and my waiting is in vain

Still the rocks pile sideways and the Wizard of Oz calls

Here come the fortunate ones who have climbed

Over the walls

Counting the miles

 I was travelling on the Orient Express 

Working as a stoker to earn my passage.

I wanted to get to Istanbul,

But we stopped off in Budapest

Then Bucharest

The rest is history

 

Well somewhere about Cluj Napoca

A strange man walks on board

A little stiff

Like he had a splint for a neck

He sits down

Calling himself The Count

I think I heard this one

before

But the thoughts don't mount

 

Soon the passengers start dropping like flies

I don't know the body count

But it was pretty high

And they all seemed to have been given

Two inoculations to the neck

The anti-vaxxers said

That was just what they'd expect

The vaccine is a killer

Well, the truth is far from that

For when he alighted from the train

I noticed the Count was rather fat

"There are more calories in a pint of blood he said

Than in a pint of beer, did you know?"

I said "I didn't know that, no",

Then he said "And who might you be young man?"

Well who is it who wants to know who I am?

Count Vlad said he, as meek as a lamb

Indeed you see he was a Siam

Or perhaps a twin of one who came from Japan

"Well of course then kind gentleman Sam

My trade is Stoker and my name be Bram"

"Unusual", said he "for such name to travel

One had thought it would stay home on the gravel"

And not gravy and stir the newly passing year

Well said I, I heard Istanbul is nice about now

I'd like to see the Blue Mosque and circle the prow

I'd like a dip in the Bosphorus and to see and delight

In the Turkish city's quarters in the midst of the night

 

"I too", said the Count "would like to explore that foreign world

Which is why I have travelled with gold and with pearls

You see a lifetime of living has set me quite dead

With the hum drum voices of pageantry and dread

I've heard too many screams and too many calls

To fill my dreams like a nightmare's halls

And instead, I want to drift down consciousness' stream

And out to Xanadu with the restless bream

I want to let go of this Romanian Rowel

I want to throw the dice, let them fall where they fall

Will you gamble with me friend come and seek out a night?

For in the shadows, they are hiding my Turkish delights"

 Well, I said "Count if you promise to behave

I'll go along quite easy though I'm not looking for my grave

I wish to have some fun and paint the town pink

With that he bit a currant bun, and I watched his teeth sink

In quite deep and noticed their length

I thought to myself now Bram how unusual their strength!

They seemed to be capable of biting through a shoe

With that I commented "Count, I'll see what I can do

When I get off at Istanbul, I’ll get cleaned up then find you."

“A deal it is” he said it kind of sly

And I thought I could see the glint of a silver moon in his eye

But now I thought I'd leave it and turned back to stoke the boiler

One day I thought I'd write a book and don't want to tell a spoiler

 

So that was how me and the Count we got well acquainted

I must say I found his ways quite strange, a little antiquated

But none the less we made it some twenty hours later

Across the Bosphorus strait, that lovely stretch of water

And the heady lights and sounds of Istanbul bit us like a bug

As like more passengers seemed to drop dead in the grip of a death hug

I counted myself lucky to have made it with the virus going round

And as I stepped off the sinking ship, I felt like the last rat who hadn't drowned

 

Istanbul was pretty amazing in its ways, the sights and sounds of markets

The smells wafted up in a maze,

I felt lost and found all at once, and gladly fell into deepest slumber

As the stars they whirled in wonder

Around and round

The fires grate was spitting, when revived I came to sitting

And remembered of my promise to the Count

It seemed so strange yet fitting, to be here with one so noble

Yet my brow was knitting as to how me and him might dance the paso doble

Train to nowhere

 Oh this is the train to nowhere

Going nowhere fast

One place we are reaching

Is back into the past

This is the train to nowhere going on so slow

The signal black out

Like in the blitz means there’s nowhere to go

The train manager told the story

The news it wasn’t good

We were on a hiding to nothing

Riding with red riding hood

Missing out the points oh

We had to slow way down

Point to point the brakes applied

But they’re all singing now

We’re on the train to nowhere

Between town and town

The rails are moving faster than we are

The fields are over taking us with a frown

 

The white waters gleams in the blue sky

The thistles and pines they sigh

The crows in a pair sit laughing

In their trees

For even they can fly faster than we

 

Even the bees who are hibernating drowsily

Buzzing so high

But their buzzes are more than matching

Ours cos tis reason this train won’t fly

We’re on the train to nowhere

It’s going nowhere fast

I think that my future’s frozen

But now I’m catching up on my past

 

Travelling tears

 Hear that steam whistle blowing

Over the hills and through the wind

Hear it blowing for you and for him

Hear it blowing for you and for him

And it will blow through the leaves and through the trees

And it will blow through the cobweb of the years

And it will shunt up the tracks ever going

And it will be like the travelling tears

It will ever go from midnight til the morning

And blow through the hills and trees

And yes you can hear that steam train blow out its warning

For it's crying those travelling tears

And sometimes joy in the joining of two people

Sometimes force through the course of the years

Sometimes loss in the pain of separation

Oh they're departing with travelling tears

In the heat in the hour of conversation

They can speak on the platform standing near

And if you wait there for me at the station

You'll be crying those travelling tears

Yes you can hear the steam train blow out its warning

It is a hoot, a toot through the years

It says decide on your final destination 

Or you'll feel those travelling tears

Or you'll shed those travelling tears

In the truth of the pale last question

You can ask me about all my fears

Well I'll know when you meet me at the station

You will cry those travelling tears

You will cry those travelling tears

Australian Reflections

Notes from a train

In the Out,

The river bed stout

Dry and dry again

Never fall the rains

On the potbellied plain

Of the crumbling green of tufted grasses

The crinkling leaves of trees in copses

The sapphire blue of the infinite sky

Against the dark green of the mountains

The peppered fields peopled by sheep

That peep from a green sea like fish out the deep

And forests, oh forests of spectacular stun

That reach to keep the splendid sun

And jack in the Marsh, rabbit on the hop

The kangaroo is filibustered in the election of the sun

Wallabies hid in the wheat

Spray of yellow rape at his feet

In the afternoon light

That is a delight

Upon the mottled plain

The mountainous lumps

Are stony stumps

Which lie in timeless stages for ages not in vain

The stirring rills which catch and spill

In pearly, swirly swills

Where swallows swoon

And boys fish with a loom

From their mother’s knitting room