Night Train

Night Train

1.
He woke that night with the ground trembling beneath
him and he sat up and looked for the horse. The horse
stood with his head raised against the desert nightsky
looking toward the west. A train was going downcountry,
the pale yellow cone of the headlight boring slowly
down the desert and the distant clatter of the
wheeltracks outlandish and mechanical in that dark
waste of silence. Finally the small square window of
the caboose trailing after. It passed and left only
the faint pale track of boilersmoke hanging over the
desert and then came the long lonesome whistle echoing
across the country where it called for the crossing
at Las Varas.

2.
He woke that night
with the ground trembling beneath him
and he sat up
and he looked for the horse.
The horse stood with his head raised
against the desert nightsky
looking toward the west.
A train was going downcountry,
the pale yellow cone of the headlight
boring slowly down the desert,
and the distant clatter of wheeltracks
outlandish and mechanical
in that dark waste of silence.
Finally the small square window
of the caboose trailing after.
It passed and left only
the faint pale track of boilersmoke
hanging over the desert
and then came the long lonesome whistle
echoing across the country
where it called
for the crossing at Las Varas.

Cormac McCarthy

from THE CROSSING.

1. McCarthy's prose
2. Line Breaks by Glenn Buttkus