Click here to listen to the song "dyea051505-37".
-- About Dyea, Alaska.  Dyea is a native word meaning "carry".

Click here to return to the song in both 16 and 96 kph mp3 versions in the Music Home Page.

Here are the words of the song:

"Dyea 051505-37"

A tree trunk in a window left behind.
It now becomes another victim
of the surly edifice of time.


It's a statement of the past
and what will never last.
Yes. But there's more.

More to this store; this dinosaur.


For thievery hit the opponent port
and stopped all of it's flow
and through this more difficult one
the travelers did go.

They went up to Canyon City from here,
from the town of Dyea.
And in Canyon City,
JUST ABOUT (!),
the cable cars did be.


But, before that, Frank Reid killed Mr. Smith,
the surly sheriff of Skagway,
prince of thieves
impersonating the law
so he could have his way.


Now my story gets thicker, my boys,
as they play with all their toys.
For the steam engine took the place of the cable car
which could have gone far.


So, I look through that window, and I can see
more than the trunk of that reddish brown tree. Yessiree.
You look at the picture,
up through the open door
and you will see through this dinosaur
-- through the "dinosaur"
into the past and the future.


For the airplane took the place
of the cable car
and that meant that none of the poor
could ever go very far.
Unless they were like the Tlingits
who could bush whack
and "live like an animal"
-- like a human --
civilized but survivable
in Alaska's great "out back".


But the concourse failed because of Mr. Reid,
who saved the honor of Skagway.
And that passage of Mr. Smith
was the beginning of Dyea's dying day.
Dying day.


And this is all that's left. Well, what did you expect?
You see, this the symbol, seen all around the world,
but the forests around it do not swirl. Like here,
where we can revere
what was almost very near
-- or should I say,
how the wrong mind-sets
threw it all away.


Oh, Dyea town! Dyea town.
Wooden buildings a-tumblin' down.
Got to go to Dyea town
to see through the door
-- got to go to the window
where the tree shows us a lot more
than just the remaining edifice
of a forgotten store.

Copyright (c) 2005 by Paul A. L. Hall.  All rights reserved.