Loss and Transformation in “Line Crew”

February 13, 2026 ~ Kat Couch

That’s one dark song lol. Continuing our look at songs from Kat’s collection Snakeweed Season, we throw a curve at our presenters. They’re usually considering a business use case or supply chain logistics, but here we’ve given them the lyrics to the gritty country tune “Line Crew” based on the poem of the same name. The podcast link is below.

Video hook, “Line Crew”, Kat’s Sundog

The discussion doesn’t back away from the bleak psychology of the narrative, and in following the story, they hit most of the high points, with Glen (not his real name) providing the commentary and Joanna May guiding the discussion.

I came out of the conversation almost apologetic. The poem, from last October, is a look back with a writer’s eye to a nine-year period during which we were evacuated twice from big wildfires in the northern Colorado backcountry and threatened by a third. Homeowners form a particular grateful bond with the firefighters protecting settlements and forest, and they sometimes get a glimpse into the crews’ daily lives, two-week shifts of brutally long days, in conditions that are difficult for most folks to imagine.

What kind of toll does that take? I can’t speak to the accuracy of the story, can’t tell you if a wildland firefighter would recognize what the protagonist thinks and feels. It’s a little slice of gothic horror dressed up in yellow Nomex. Our presenters spend some time with that as well, because while they may be more comfortable with board reports, they don’t miss a trick.

Line Crew
(An Outlaw Country song by the band Kat’s Sundog)

Lyrics

[Intro, spoken over a mournful electric guitar riff]
You keep from the fire things you can’t name
Missed birthdays, an empty home,
a poker game
And you pass hurt like you pass a hat
Cause you can’t fight fire like you fight a man

[Verse 1]
We keep from the fire that we won’t be the same
Kids’ birthdays, empty houses
It’s a losing game
Fire says it’s sorry ‘bout my dog
Presses his tags in my hand with a burning log
Says that ain’t who I am, with a bitter grin
A liar in a yellow coat, a restless critter

[Pre-Chorus]
Oh, the inferno’s cryin’ black
For the houses it consumed
But it stalks ‘em like a killer
Going room to room

[Chorus]
So I work the line, and I hold my ground
The taste of ash and sweat in my mouth
It’s a devil’s dance where you find some peace
Out here among still-livin’ trees
Yeah, I work the line

[Verse 2]
I keep from the fire our prayers for rain
The stone in the creek, the mule deer’s pain
But it haunts the ridge with a cruel hot thirst
Though the one-horse town it took was the worst
It wails like it’s still got a soul to save
While it goes back to digging graves

[Pre-Chorus]
Oh, the inferno’s cryin’ black
For the houses it consumed
But it stalks ‘em like a killer
Going room to room

[Chorus]
So I work the line, and I hold my ground
The taste of ash and sweat in my mouth
It’s a devil’s dance where you find some peace
Out here among still-livin’ trees
Yeah, I work the line

[Bridge]
But I told that fire where I keep my gun
Said, “I’ll never leave ‘til this war’s done”
And in the chill before the sun
I saw it curled up, weary and worn
Like a child, like a red wolf bitch
In a den of burning pitch

[Dueling guitars, gritty, soaring]

[Chorus]
So I work the line, and I hold my ground
The taste of ash and sweat in my mouth
It’s a devil’s dance where you find some peace
Out here among still-livin’ trees
Yeah, I work the line

[Outro, the lone guitar riff from the intro]
You keep from the fire
You’re no longer the same…
Hell, your breath is smoke
And your eyes are gone
And your godless hands
Are wild with flame…
[Fade out]

You can listen to the song here:
https://suno.com/s/RswUHvGpIUkj58PM

Line Crew Podcast

“Ghost” and the Machinery of Grief

February 11, 2026February 13, 2026 ~ Kat Couch

We’re going to do something a little different today and go the podcast route with a look at the poem “Ghost” from last October. Actually, one generation removed from the poem, because the hosts of the discussion are reading from the lyrics of a bluegrass song by Kat’s Sundog based on the poem. The lyrics follow below.

The discussion itself was generated with a Google Notebooks tool, but objections to AI aside, one thing about these tools is clear: chatbots struggle to write a decent poem, but their analysis of poetry is extraordinarily good and sometimes provocative. At the very least, they provide a starting point for further insight.

Here are the song’s lyrics:

Ghost
(A traditional bluegrass song by the band Kat’s Sundog)

[Intro, instrumental, slow-paced banjo & fiddle picking, melancholy mandolin, building to a full band entry before settling into verse tempo]

[Verse 1]
A trail cam tied to an old pine limb
In the cool, thin mountain air
Caught a shadow movin’ through the gray
Of a cold September day
A bobcat, slow n’ easy on her paws
A rabbit swinging from her jaws
Eight forty-eight in the autumn pines
Though the dead ain’t counting time

[Pre-Chorus]
And the picture frames what the heart can’t keep
The sigh of a soul released
We freeze the moment to save the spark
Before it fades into the dark

[Chorus]
Yeah, we’re keepin’ your ghost here
Though you’re long gone
Clingin’ to the shade you left
Of what’s left here
Holding our breath like a hollow
Can’t lay you down, can’t follow

[Verse 2]
That mountain cottontail swaying
The hunter on her pendulum way
Through the greasewood and the brush
Beast too beautiful to touch
Stripes on her haunches in the dimming light
Autumn moon makin’ her bright eyes wild
Slides through the branches like a work of art
Stealing what’s still breathing from my beating heart

[Bridge]
Oh, little one, you’re wantin’ to go
Where the wild things run and the cold winds blow
But babe, give us back his form
We’re holdin’ on, we’re holdin’ on

[Instrumental break, fiddle solo over driving banjo]

[Chorus]
Yeah, we’re keepin’ your ghost here
Though you’re long gone
Clingin’ to the shade you left
Of what’s left here
Holding our breath like a hollow
Can’t lay you down, can’t follow

[Outro]
Well, she’s carrying the host here
We’d love back to livin’
Bringin’ back the heartache we bin given
[Fading mandolin]

And if you want to listen to the song, it’s here: https://suno.com/s/bB7Qh9uHaXeMOFjg

Ghost Podcast

I’m Not Going to Say This Twice (but if I do, I’m going to add more birds)

September 5, 2025 ~ Kat Couch

Be sure in your art.
By all means be tapped out, hard up,
on-your-beam-ends poor if you are,
but when you dance,
dance mansions, parks, chestnut trees
with pale pyramid flowers.
Flex an arm: banknotes
flutter from your fingers
like swallows. Mint motion.

Even your journals grant
principalities to princes.
The huge coffered door of your hall
bends and groans with the press
of secretaries and goatherds
clutching spice boxes,
ranch hands with gold watches,
bluebird navies, teak-timbered ships.
Go out to the harbor this morning
and swing your ideas against
their sides. Send them on their way.

Be nervous if you must,
flop-sweat stopped
like a drowned bottle,
but your hands when they draw,
draw water from rock —
white pelicans,
the most self-absorbed things in the sky,
wheel and rest at your feet,
canyons open,
the horizon duplicates itself
infinitely,
dark for the pearls of stars.

Lack faith if you do,
but your voice, when you sing along,
peals from Spanish mission towers,
beams creak with the weight of bells,
dun valleys fill and green,
dwarf pines whistle and whisper.
Keep your head down:
vesper sparrows have made a nest
in your faithless hair.

It has always been that way.
The monks have gathered for Matins
and the abbot is on the stair.
He has your arms and eyes, your hands.
And the old voice —
the one we put together
from sewn leather, trail dust,
sage, salt, wind whipped,
like a prayer —
lifts, hums, moves
the whole goddamn building
from the rafters to the crypt.

Reading The Shrine of the Stations of the Cross

June 22, 2023 ~ Kat Couch