Out there on some lonesome stretch of West Texas highway, when the night is black and the only light is the orange glow of your cigarette, Waylon Jennings’ “Two Streaks of Steel” comes creeping through the speakers like a ghost that never learned how to leave. Released in 1978 on the album I’ve Always Been Crazy, it’s barely three minutes long, yet it carries the weight of a lifetime of goodbyes. Two parallel railroad tracks disappearing into the dark, the low moan of a distant train whistle, and a love that’s pulling out for good. That’s all Waylon needs. No chorus hook, no flashy guitar solo—just a voice like aged bourbon telling you the hardest truth country music ever dared whisper: some people leave, and the leaving never really ends.

The song opens with that unmistakable Jennings baritone, low and weathered, painting the scene so vivid you can almost feel the gravel under your boots: “Two streaks of steel runnin’ side by side / Through the heart of Dixie to the Jersey shore…” He’s not just talking about railroad tracks. He’s talking about the moment you realize the person you love has one foot on the platform and one foot already gone. The train doesn’t even have to pull in yet; the tracks are enough. They’re the promise of departure. They’re the cold, hard proof that love can be as unforgiving as iron.

Waylon didn’t write it—credit goes to the great Lefty Frizzell—but damn if he didn’t own it. He sings it like a man who’s stood on too many midnight platforms watching taillights fade, like someone who’s felt the ground shake under a departing freight and known exactly what that rumble means. There’s no self-pity here, no begging her to stay. Just a quiet, brutal acceptance: “I’ll be like those two streaks of steel / Straight and smooth and cold…” That line hits like a spike through the chest. He’s not going to chase the train. He’s going to become the tracks—unbending, unfeeling, letting her roll right over him into forever.

What makes the song eternal is how little it needs. A sparse acoustic guitar, a faint steel guitar crying in the background, and Waylon’s voice doing all the heavy lifting. No drums, no fiddle, no outlaw swagger—just the sound of a heart turning itself inside out. It’s the kind of record you play when you’re three whiskeys deep and the only thing keeping you company is the memory of someone who ain’t coming back. You don’t dance to it. You don’t sing along. You just sit there in the dark and let it hurt.

Forty-seven years later, “Two Streaks of Steel” still ambushes you on some back-road radio station at 2 a.m. and suddenly you’re right back there—watching those taillights disappear, hearing that whistle fade, feeling the ground go cold beneath your feet. Waylon’s been gone since 2002, but every time that song plays, he’s standing right beside you on the platform, cigarette glowing, nodding like he knows exactly who you lost.

Because some goodbyes don’t end when the train pulls out. Some goodbyes just keep rolling, mile after mile, two streaks of steel straight into the night, taking everything you ever loved with them.

And you? You just learn to live with the echo.