I am just an Indian and once this was my land
Now it's been taking from me by the coming of a white man
And the anger makes my blood run hot and heavy in my veins
Everytime I think about the coming of the trains.
The day was hot and dusty in the year of '69
As we heard the whistle blowing somewhere down the line
That was the year I rode with Frank and Jesse James
As we waited for the coming and the going of the trains.
The drought hit west Texas the ground was cracked and dry
We just had to have some water or our crops would surely die
The railroad shipped this water till we finally got some rain
And I thanked God for the coming and the going of the trains.
I lived behind these iron bars I'm a prisoner doing time
And I've heard that midnight freight pass at least the thousand times
And I spent my time a walking to the door and back again
And marking down the coming and the going of the trains.
I've always been an engineer and trains're all I know
Ah they don't want me anymore and they say that I'm too old
But my cabin at the crossing sorta helps to ease my pain
For I just had to feel the coming and the going of the trains.
The trucks and planes're faster now and the railroad is too slow
And they just came and told me that my railroad has to go
The hands that built the railroad through sweat and blood and pain
Will sign the final papers of the going of the trains.
And I have seen the coming and the going of the trains...