Did Sandburg have anything against Omaha? Specifically: > I am riding on a limited express, one of the crack trains of the nation. > > Hurtling across the prairie into blue haze and dark air go fifteen all-steel coaches holding a thousand people. > > (All the coaches shall be scrap and rust and all the men and women laughing in the diners and sleepers shall pass to ashes.) > > I ask a man in the smoker where he is going and he answers: “Omaha.” > > Sandburg: Limited It's a profound poem wrapped in a shell of the everyday, and it's title is perhaps taken as a commentary on the mundane mindset. I wouldn't think Sandburg means anything by relating Omaha specifically to non-existence, possibly the name of the city just scans, or represents the heartland, but then I think of Strindberg naming his famous play about marriage "The Dance of Death" and wonder... **Q: Did Sandburg have any negative feelings about the wonderful city of Omaha?**

Read Sandburg's poem, "Omaha". I think you'll see that he does not: "...Omaha works to get the world a breakfast."

> Omaha, the roughneck, feeds armies,
> Eats and swears from a dirty face.
> Omaha works to get the world a breakfast.