A Good Companion

All romantics dream of a better life, a better love. Not just for themselves, but for everyone. Bruce Springsteen wants us to "get ready" for that romantic and spiritual journey. This time "the train" is not just looking for passengers for freedom and liberty (like The Underground Railroad), but for hope and love.
   The Land of Hope is the United States of America, the spot that immigrants dreamed of as they came through Ellis Island.

We must continue to have dreams of hope and love. "Once you allow yourself to dream, you can’t go back. Once you buy into the risk of a new tomorrow, a different, hopefully better future, going back is for people with less intestinal fortitude."  The second verse of Bruce Springsteen's song continues:

I will provide for you

And I'll stand by your side

You'll need a good companion for

This part of the ride

Leave behind your sorrows

Let this day be the last

Tomorrow there'll be sunshine

And all this darkness past

Big wheels roll through fields where sunlight streams

Meet me in the Land of Hope and Dreams.

Who makes up the community in the Land of Hope and Dreams?    Everyday folks.  You and me.  Nobody special, but that’s what makes us and the Land of Hope and Dreams so beautiful –we’re all welcome. 

Bruce Springsteen invite us to get on board with him. He turns to the crowd and calls: "Hop on this train. Let me see your hands." In so doing, he joins the pantheon of other dreamers whose quotes are listed below. These poets/dreamers all share one thing in common: a love for this world and the people in it, no matter whether you are saints or sinners. Say "Amen" somebody.

You may say I'm a dreamer,

but I'm not the only one, 

I hope some day you'll join us,

And the world will be as one.

   ~JOHN LENNON, Imagine

We are such stuff

As dreams are made on, and our little life

is rounded with a sleep.

  ~WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, The Tempest

They who dream by day are cognizant of many things 

which escape those who dream only by night.

 ~EDGAR ALLAN POE, "Eleonora"