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 On the southbound odyssey The train goes out at Kankakee Rolls along past houses, farms and fields Pa**in' trains that have no name Freight yards full of old black men And the graveyard of the rusted automobiles Good morning America how are you 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 Playin' cards with the old men in the club car A penny a point ain't no one keepin' score Pa** the paper bag that holds the bottle And feel the wheels rumblin' beneath the floor And the sons of pullman porters And the sons of engineers Ride their father's magic carpet made of steam Mothers with their babes asleep Rocking to the gentle beat The rhythm of the rails is all they dream Good morning America how are you 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 Nighttime on The City of New Orleans Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee Half way home, and we'll be there by morning Through the Mississippi darkness Rolling down to the sea And all the towns and people seem To change into a bad dream The steel rails still ain't heard the news The conductor sings his songs again Pa**engers will please refrain This train's got to disappear in railroad blues Good night, America, how are you? 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 I'll be gone a million miles when the race is run I'll be gooooOOOOOne