Creedence Clearwater Revival Appreciation Week: Day...

Creedence Clearwater Revival Appreciation Week: Day Four

Excerpt from Cross-Tie Walker by Jackson Belleville:

"It's day four. Coal Run, Kentucky, 'where what remains gets pressured till it combusts', is thousands of rusty tracks behind me.

I imagine my father is back there on his fifth Redhook Rye. Drinkin' from that filthy cup with the broken handle and chipped rim from when he brought it too hard to his greedy mouth. There was no way that cheap ceramic wasn't gonna crack 'gainst his big yellow chompers.

Yeah, he's probably sittin' on that crate next to a pile of wrenches in the gravel and that busted ol' Ford. 'Fixin' m'chariot.' The only use that engine has is as a perch for crows, restin' from the heat on the cool cast-iron, with the hood as a parasol.

I can almost hear the old man cursin' my name in between his sloppy sips.

My mother… She…

It ain't right to care 'bout people who never gave a damn 'bout you.

'Thousands of rusty tracks behind me.'

I look out the flatcar at stalks of hard white wheat movin' like the waves of a golden sea. At least what I imagine waves to look and move like. S'pose I'll find out in a few more weeks.

For now I'm just a cross-tie walker, where the freight trains run.

Run, run, run, run."