Fly Over Lyrics

“each day—

a treasured unimportance”

—William Stafford, “The

Rescued Year,” Rescuing

Some Years in Kansas

______________________

A couple guys in first class on a flight— 
From New York to Los Angeles

 
Kinda making small talk killing time—

After a few drinks flirting with each other 

30, 000 feet above high over Kansas—

One vast sea of yellow gold wheatfields

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“Man it all looks the same” one guy says—

“Miles and miles of back roads and highways” 

“Little nowhere towns with no names—

Way down there in the middle of nowhere”

“Yeah, but lots of cute cowboys in rodeos”—

The other guy says who was born down there

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“Hot RFD boyz & beat-up Chevy Ford pickups—

Nights under the Tallgrass Prairie sky”

“Busting their ass harvesting wheat—

Drop-dead young Cattlemen’s son in jeans”

“Pointy-toed cowboy boots, shit-kickin’ ones—

Butchy FFA blue corduroy jackets trim & tight”

___________________

”I grew up down there in the Fly Over States—

They grow a mean Potawatomi Gold down there”

“They know how to get off really hard—

Banging their heads against the gun-racks”

“Ever had a rodeo star in a motel bed—

Digging his cowboy boot spurs in real deep?”

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“You can have New York and California—

The same with the Big Apple and LA”

“I used to listen to the Santa Fe trains—

Hugging the rails and blaring away”

“I used to live way down there—

Where the roads & rails & rivers were one”

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“On the plains & prairies of Kansas—

but there weren’t anymore jobs around”

“No more family farms in the country—

GM Genetically Modified wheat and corn”

“Small towns into ghost towns everywhere—

Big towns into ghost malls here & there”

______________________

“Bug-splats on the Big Diesel Trucks—

Driving late at night thru Drive-Thu States”

“You'd think heaven closed its doors—

Those Fly Over States going Badlands”

”Take a ride across the Kansas badlands—

You’ll see why they’re Fly Over States now”

______________________

“Feel that freedom on your face—

What used to be, once way down there”

“Breathe in all that open Midwest air—

Ain’t no cute cowboys down there anymore”