The Middlewesterner

LINES FOR JANUARY 30

Now the sky
is skinned.

The blue of it
goes dark,

the silence
enormous.

LINES FOR JANUARY 29

Breast of
red-tail

shines like
corn husk

held in
net of

naked
branches.

LINES FOR JANUARY 28

Great wind
like a whip
in storm clouds.

The red-tail
sets down hard.

LINES FOR JANUARY 27

Stars scatter.
Day will be

breaking. In
some of these

old, humble
houses lights,

already
coming on.

LINES FOR JANUARY 26

The wind. An old man
at the window.
A scraping sound

where nothing moves.

GOOD NEWS FOR
THE LAST CABOOSE

LINES FOR JANUARY 23

They paint themselves in-
to the corner, then wail at

the limits of the world.

LINES FOR JANUARY 22

Grind the morning
and find

the mess you've made
of things.

Hope is a cup
of ocean.

DOC ABBICK IN TRINITY
RELEASES THE LAST CABOOSE


It's not like I haven't been busy.

We three of Doc Abbick in Trinity have just released our second album, one of fifteen original train songs called The Last Caboose. I wrote most of the lyrics for fourteen of the songs; the other is an instrumental. Dean Schechinger wrote most of the melodies. Doc Abbick put words and melodies together, arranging and producing our effort. And it's a good one.

I've always thought that if a song writer was any good, he will have written a good train song. So why not write a whole album of them? My band-mates agreed to give it a try. Certainly there are a lot of ways to approach the topic: love songs ("Lay Me Down" and "Sweet Wild Rose"), the break up of a love affair ("One Way Out of Town"), stories of a sick old man giving a little boy a train yard tour ("His Last Tour"), a ghost train coming to take trainmen on their last ride ("Ghost Train"), the midnight train that doesn't come through town any longer ("Midnight Train"), and a young model railroader at the controls ("Mountain 4-8-2). You add, maybe, a couple of hobo songs ("Tramps on the Track" and "Hobo's Admonition"), one "talking blues" recommendation for how to deal with the nuclear waste problem ("Glow Train"), and a lilting song about a railroad in the tropics ("Railroad in the Sun"). What could you be missing? Oh, yeah – you gotta have some train wrecks ("Last Love Letter" and "Slow Your Engine Down") and an instrumental ("Roundhouse"). And, of course, you need the title song ("The Last Caboose"):

There she sits
The last caboose
In the park
Of no more use
Her ghost is
But a shadow
Like her paint
She's faded now



It always helps if you've got Johnny Cash working with you. We were on the verge of throwing out "Slow Your Engine Down" as unworkable when I asked the guys if we could maybe sleep on it before making a final decision. About four o'clock that morning, Johnny Cash sang the song to me in a dream. I woke with a start. When the band got back together later that morning to continue work, we revised the song to approximate what I'd heard in my dream, and we now think of it as something of a tribute to the Man in Black.

I'm the guy who writes, so I'm charged with doing the promotion. I've created a presence for us on MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/docabbickintrinity . I've ordered postcards with the album cover on one side and the list of our songs on the other (if you'd like to have some of the postcards, let me know). I've gotten review copies out to the magazines and promotional copies out to radio stations. I have written some train magazines to see if they'd be interested in featuring our CD. I've written train museums to see if might want copies of The Last Caboose for the gift shop. I was interviewed by the Ripon Commonwealth Press and featured in the editor's column. And like that.

As I say, it's not like I haven't been busy.

LINES FOR JANUARY 21

Open a vein
and bleed. For what?

A word. Something
to make a difference.

LINES FOR JANUARY 20

A spin of stars.
The ice. The tick,

tick of midnight.
Done and undone,

we hope for sleep.
Sleep hopes for us.

LINES FOR JANUARY 19

How cold?
Enough

that smoke
won't rise.

It hits
the ground,

a crys-
tal sound.

LINES FOR JANUARY 16

A winter whip
of clouds, low

and dark, as
if the worst is

yet to come.

LINES FOR JANUARY 15

Hollow. Cracked like an orange
cup – the sky.

LINES FOR JANUARY 14

A big boat
being towed
in big snow.

A good day
to go slow.

LINES FOR JANUARY 13

Too
many, these

days, this
silence,

what?

LINES FOR JANUARY 12

Black cattle.
The dark hill.

A lowering
call rises.

LINES FOR JANUARY 9

The great flatness and water
works a rich meander.

LINES FOR JANUARY 9

The great flatness and water
works a rich meander.

LINES FOR JANUARY 8

Yes, there are
words I cannot
use. They are
useless here –

plastic
catatonic,
beautiful.

And there are
those I need,
cannot make
do without –

mud,
blood,
sorrow.

LINES FOR JANUARY 7

Clearing the driveway
this winter day

I have a moment
of enlightenment –

this, that I am
happy to be

here with the snow,
with you.

LINES FOR JANUARY 6

The wind
promises snow.

Hurry, crow.

LINES FOR JANUARY 5

Frog in winter, or
chunk of asphalt.

LINES FOR JANUARY 2

Words break,
and how.

Their husks,
crack'd o-

pen, show
nothing,

no meat,
no nut,

worse than
silence.

LINES FOR JANUARY 1

So what

does it
mean – this

ringing
silence,

bell-like
empti-

ness, smudge
of ash,

midnight
terror,

this lone-
liness.