BettertonTrains (lyric)
Crowded boardwalk
Saturday night
Arcade games
In pinball light
Smells like popcorn
And stale beer
I remember 
Every year
Noise in the barrooms
Noise in the barrooms
Laughter and voices spill from the saloons
(Bingo calls three cards a dime
If I had your money, baby, I’d burn mine
If I had your money, baby, I’d burn mine)
Whiffle ball 
On the front lawn
Flagpole base
Two men on
Mel Famey walked us
I laughed and laughed
Don’t worry the future
Bother the past
Parents played poker
Smoked cigarettes
We stole their beer and drank till wet
Trains don’t run to Betterton now
Trains never did
Close as they came was Chestertown then
When I was still a kid
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
Every once in a while
Every little once in a while
I go home every once in a while
Every little once in a while
You guys wanna buy some corn? I said
You guys wanna buy some corn? I said
Jack Wheatley was a mountain in the flatland where he was born 
The sun shore burned
Bleached my hair
Stars shined bright
At night out there
Bonfire burning
Down on the beach
Driftwood and dancing
Life was sweet
Something so simple
So solid and true
Love remains in Betterton love reminds you
Trains don’t run to Betterton now
Trains never did
Close as they came was Chestertown then
When I was still a kid
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
Every once in a while
Every little once in a while
I go home every once in a while
Every little once in a while
A gang of kids
On the Indian Bridge
Evergreen Knoll
A simple wish
Cigarettes burning
Twilight’s last gleam
An eight track player
Sings John Lennon’s Dream
Who’s got Borkum?
Who’s got Boones Farm?
Let’s raise our voices and see if they’re home
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
(Whatever happened to?)
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
(Whatever happened to?)
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
Joyce Jeff and Lisa
Jeff and Lisa
Perspective’s easy
Distance plus years
Add inventory
Subtract fears
Pictures on postcards
Old carousels
Faces and memories
Deeper than wells
Screams in the Funhouse
Bumper cars The Whip
That pool table’s open rack ‘em real quick
In the middle of a cornfield
In the middle of the night
I hear a freight train 
Crack the sky
Trains don’t run to Betterton now
Trains never did
Close as they came was Chestertown then
When I was still a kid
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
Every once in a while
Every little once in a while
I go home every once in a while
Every little once in a while
Moon rising 
Cattail Island
Lights in heaven
Toes in cool sand
Shooting stars 
Fallen graces
Time is alive
In quiet places
Pass me the bottle
Pass me the bottle
Boat on the bay passes by at full throttle
Too many faces 
Too many mistakes 
Too much baby you’re too much for me
Trains don’t run to Betterton now
Trains never did
Close as they came was Chestertown then
When I was still a kid
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
I go home in the summer
Sometimes
Sometimes I go home
Every once in a while
Every little once in a while
I go home every once in a while
Every little once in a while
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
(Whatever happened to?)
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
(Whatever happened to?)
Jo Ron Betty Carol Joyce Jeff and Lisa
Joyce Jeff and Lisa
Jeff and Lisa

Lisa
Lisa
I cannot write without my pen
I cannot explain now back then
I cannot say how every train
Takes me back to Betterton


Betterton Trains

Hard

You got a love so hard
It tears my heart apart
You got a love so hard
So hard

There was a time when I
Would have laid down my life
I would have laid down my life
St. Paddy’s Day
1988
Day we met
At the Boston parade
Green beer bongs
Lots o’ Irish songs
I played guitar
You sang along
(It wasn’t always bad
It wasn’t all bad)
	CHROUS

Afraid insecure
I promised you more
Then even I could endure
Mystic nights
Summer sexual rites
I said, “I do”
You said, “I might”
Steamboat Inn
We sealed our sin
Crazy in love
What a bargain
(I would pay any price
I’d still pay any price)
	CHORUS

I saw pain on your face
That time could not erase
Becoming moments of grace
Fall River
Charlton Hospital
Where we met Sally
Our daughter
Five toe feet
Fresh people sweet
I kissed her fingers 
Cried on your sheets
(The best of both of us
She’s the best of both of us)
	CHORUS

Too many lost gig nights
Your eyes lost light
Your eyes lost their soft white light
Dirty diapers
Neighborhood vipers
You tried to fit but
Could not like hers
All the drama
And go-go-gran-mama
Could not sustain
Your interest-o-rama
(Could not sustain your brain
Could not entertain your brain)
	CHORUS

Sally came to me
“Dad why so gloomy
Why are you always so gloomy”
Too many affairs
Mom’s million-mile stare
Is a distance 
No love can bear
But all was not lost
Considering the cost
Darling I swore 
Silver on the frost
(Never hopeless with hope
It’s never hopeless with hope)
	CHORUS

The Y2K fuss
Ways we learned to cuss
So many different ways to cuss
The Fontainebleau
Blonds you knew I knew
The myriad ways
I broke you in two
Car crash in Oh Six
On Tappahannock
Crushed your spirit
And broke your neck
(Life is a dangerous game
Ours was a dangerous game)
	CHORUS

Suddenly pills
Pains you tried to kill
All of the pains you tried to kill
An oxy daze
No love can raise
Can’t fight the monkey
That drives your brain
Reasons to quit
Sweat and blood and shit
Addiction is
Bottomless pit
(I can’t fight no more
I can’t fight it no more)
	CHORUS

I kept playing gigs
In order to pay bills
Just as a way to pay the bills
June 25th
2006
Sally found you dead
On basement steps
EMT help
What did she self?
We didn’t know
So hated ourselves
(There’s no forgiving that
There is no forgiving that)
	CHORUS

Then came the road to hope
Twelves Steps as a means to cope
I knew that you had found your rope
Every quarter
You relapsed harder
Promises became
Goods to barter
There is no dealing
A soul who’s stealing
No trusting the word
No love in that feeling
(It’s a hard way to die
A hard hard way to die)
	CHORUS

There’s an old photograph
Of Sally in your lap
Happy and safe inside a laugh
The 4th of July
2009
Found you dead again
Me this time
A cold bathtub
I called 911
I knew the routine
I was totally numb
(This could be the last time
This has to be the very last time)
	CHORUS

Sally dropped out of school
Held your hand and wiped your drool
She held your hand and wiped your drool
Pinpoint eyes
Comatose quiet
In vegetative states
Addicts quit lying
There’s intubation
Ventilation
The constant fear
And sad frustration
(Who signs up for this?
No one signs up for this)
	CHORUS

There was a time when I
Would have laid down my life
I would have just to keep you alive
St. Paddy’s Day
2013
The day we got
The doctor’s lien
Family and friends
Witness the end
I played guitar
Sally violin
(And it’s all over now
It’s all so over now)
	CHORUS

Life is for the living
Even if you aren’t in it
Even though you aren’t in it
At an Al-Anon meeting
2014
I met a lady
Her husband died speeding
It’s harder without you
I don’t know what to do
I think of you often
It’s sort of like voodoo
(It can’t always be bad
It won’t all be bad)
	CHORUS

The sun is rising 
and I look to the east…



johnkarwacki