The Western and Cowboy poetry on this site was inspired by a
1940's acquaintance with Badger Clark (then Poet Laureate of
South Dakota), my experience as a ranch hand in the Sandhills of
Nebraska in the 1930's and 40's, and a more recent
opportunity to meet Sherman Alexie (a Native American poet,
novelist, and screenwriter). All of the poems on the site are
copyrighted and permission is required to reproduce or distribute
them in any form. For permissions, please send us an email
request by clicking here.
Earlier Poems Published and Archived - The poems which
previously appeared on this page have been published in three
volumes of western and cowboy poetry...Where Horses Reign;
Sun, Sand & Soapweed; Western Images; and Views from the Saddle...all of
which are available through any local or internet bookseller. The
contents of the four volumes are listed on an archives page on this site. Quite a number of my poems
also appear on the premier website for cowboy poetry, CowboyPoetry.com.
Poems appear in
date order with the most recent first.
If a
poem's title is highlighted when you pass the cursor over it,
and you have Javascript enabled, some background information and
notes are available by clicking on that title. A second click
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One of my heroes is Earl Pickles from the cartoon strip created by Brian Crane and syndicated to newspapers throughout the U.S. Earl is a real philosopher and occasionally blossoms out in cowboy boots, Stetson hat, and snap-button shirt to write his version of cowboy poetry.
Earl, you're my hero,
so brave, tall and true,
a cowboy poet,
a real buckaroo.
In your cowboy boots
and your cowboy hat,
with pencil in hand,
you've got it down pat.
You're a real poet,
writin' cowboy verse,
you've proven to us
your talent's diverse.
So write right along
on this trail you've found,
turnin' out verses
on subjects profound.
Economic conditions today remind a lot of us older folks about the Great Depression. The times were stark, banks were closed, and life was complicated by an extended drought. It left a lot of rural folks without money and no prospect of crops.
Hank stood, lookin' toward the east
wonderin', as always,
if change would come with a new dawn
and end these rainless days.
Waitin' for change was the mantra
he suffered though each day,
always wonderin' what would be
if nature had it's way.
The windmill was near pumpin' dust
and cattle's ribs were showin'
from lack of good feed and water
and their walk was slowin'.
Even ma and the kids suffered
from killin' heat and dust
but worst of all was not knowin'
whether life could adjust.
Oh, there was food in the pantry,
enough to just get by,
but unless rains came pretty soon
some stock would surely die.
Beef was just five dollars a head,
not much but some for sure,
to help us live out this dry spell
and see that we endure.
Hank held out hope for tomorrow,
quite cautiously indeed,
but doubts troubled his mind and thoughts,
would nature intercede?
Some cowboys are pretty good with rope tricks. I never saw one that could twirl a lasso so fast it would catch fire but it might be interesting if that happened.
Bill was a ropin' fool,
his ropin' was the best,
and he was much admired
throughout the great Northwest.
When it came to ropin'
he was the greatest star,
folks'd come to see him
from nearby and afar.
He'd do his ropin' tricks
and tell a tale or two,
designed to get applause,
and then he'd start anew.
His last time on the stage,
twirlin' that rope so fast
the loop began to smoke
and folks was all aghast.
The Feds showed up right then
and hauled Bill off to jail,
'cause of that smokin' hemp,
'though Bill ne'er did inhale.
Being alone doesn't necessarily make you feel alone or lonely. There's a world of things to think about and cowboys truly do their share of thinking when they're alone on the trail.
When you ride out all by yourself,
maybe lookin' for strays,
you never know how long you'll be,
you may be gone for days.
So you become quite efficient,
in tendin' to your needs,
you've gotta eat and tend your horse
while you avoid misdeeds.
Approachin' eve'nin' you make camp...
tendin' your horse is first...
so you serve up a cup of oats
and satisfy his thirst.
Your life depends on that old horse,
to get you out 'n back,
so he gets pampered quite a bit
'fore you can hit the sack.
Then you gather chips for the fire
and lay out evenin' grub,
then spread out your canvas bedroll
beneath a sagebrush shrub.
You fry up some bacon slices,
to have there with your beans,
then as a pot of coffee boils,
you enjoy eve'nin' scenes.
It ain't truely a lonely life
because you're not alone,
the glitter of the western stars
will never be outshown,
There ain't no telephones that ring,
or cars a roarin' past,
just the quiet peace of the night,
a wonderous contrast.
My own boyhood dream was to be a cowboy and that dream came true. It was a good healthy life and, although I enjoyed it, I never returned to the ranch after I was discharged from the Army Air Corps at the end of WWII.
It is the dream of ev'ry boy
to live out in the west,
to live the life of a cowboy,
and there to meet life's test.
Oh, it'd be so grand, they think,
to live that kind of life,
to ride and rope and be so free,
avoidin' daily strife.
To visit Indians on the range,
to camp out ev'ry night,
to see the colors of sunset,
and early morning light.
Yes, it's a dream that young lads have,
seein' the glory side
of life and livin' on the range,
of self-sufficient pride.
But the truth is a bit diff'rent,
there's heat and dust and cold
and the work is quite demandin',
unlike what we've been told.
But, boys, in spite of all that's said,
it's a grand place to live
with adventure and challenges,
demandin' all you have to give.
Calamity Jane was one of the most famous women of the west. From the time she was about thirteen, she dressed and worked as a man, highly respected for her shooting ability. One time she didn't have her pistol handy so she used a meat cleaver to capture a killer.
Calamity was one of the good guys,
a friend and buddy to all,
and it was scarcely known to anyone
that she weren't a guy at all.
Underneath all them baggy clothes she wore,
she was female as could be.
Her face was tanned and weathered by the sun;
male, so far as one could see.
Calamity sorta favored Wild Bill
but he fancied another gal
and married her instead of Calamity,
regardin' Jane as just a pal.
Not much later, Wild Bill Hickock was shot
by a fame-seekin' joker,
at the Bell Union Saloon in Cheyenne,
as he sat playin' poker.
Jack McCall, the cruel killer of Wild Bill,
hid in Shurdy's butcher shop
where he was found by Calamity Jane,
his hiddin' put to a stop.
Calamity waved a cleaver at him
and held him there for a while,
he did escape, only to be recaught,
and then sent away for trial.
Didn't hurt Calamity's feelin's none
when old Jack was tried and hung
and she went on to become quite well known,
stories of her deeds still sung.
I've never known a cowboy who hasn't experienced some painful conflict with a saddle horn. There's a reason for that, them things are alive! They've forgotten the reason for their creation was to be an aid in roping and have invented other pastimes.
If I was really meant to ride
then I shoulda been born
with some natural protection
against that saddle horn.
Saddle horns was meant for ropin',
and that's their only use,
otherwise they're inanimate,
waitin' to give abuse.
I swear that there's life in that horn,
although it just sits there
waitin' for the right time to act,
and you don't have a prayer.
Now ev'ry thing there is has life,
some aged shamans say,
and I reckon I believe that,
it just seems nature's way.
These saddle horns are devious,
they're live as they can be,
just sittin' there on the saddle,
and waitin' there for me.
Waitin until I get bucked up
and then come down real hard,
they pretend inanimation
until I am off guard.
So I'm done with western saddles,
it's English ones for me,
'cause they don't have no saddle horns
fixed to their saddle tree.
We tried to be self-sufficient and raise what we could out on the ranch but it seems like the bugs sometimes enjoyed the garden more than we did. I remember pickin' bugs, potato bugs, seems like for days on end. There was also a liberal use of sulphur and some other powdered insecticides but they didn't seem to deter the bugs much.
Mama, how does your garden grow?
It grows with bugs galore,
we kill a million ev'ry day,
that task's our daily chore.
We pick a peck or more of bugs
and cast them in the crick
but each day there's a whole bunch more,
their birth rate is so quick.
We'd rather grow some food for us.
instead of growin' bugs,
but there's no time to harvest food,
we just reap garden thugs.
It takes a special breed to be a cowboy. Much of the time, it's a lonely job tending the herd and suffering the dust and heat and cold; doing the mundane things that need doing around the ranch. But, that said, cowboys are independent, hard-working, and dedicated individuals who would most likely be unhappy doing anything else.
If we could but see what a man could be,
we'd surely understand
the challenges faced in a life so graced
here in this western land.
These cowboys out here have no cause to fear,
each day bringing the same,
as they go their way with plenty to say,
and little chance for fame.
There's much work to do, hands here are too few,
so it's dawn until dark,
doin' all they can within the day's span,
here where life is so stark.
There are great rewards that this life affords
out here where men are free,
where they labor on dependin' on brawn,
workin' for you and me.
Tendin' the cattle, ready for battle,
but peaceable are they,
dislikin' walkin', lovin' their talkin',
livin' the western way.
They stress they are free as they ought to be.
'Though they work for the brand,
their lives are their own, they're not all alone,
here in this western land.
Pay was never very great out on the ranch and riding line or wintering in a line shack could be mighty lonely. Cowboys always looked forward to getting into town. They'd generally buy essentials and, more frequently than not, shoot the rest on fun and relaxation.
I've a hankerin' to go to town
and get my whistle wet.
I've been stranded for weeks out here
and I've begun to fret.
This old line shack is mighty small,
the walls are closin' in,
ain't seen no one for weeks on end,
my temper's wearin' thin.
I gotta talk to someone soon,
palav'rin' is my style,
and I've been so doggone lonely,
I'd settle for a smile.
There's three months of pay in my kit,
I'm lonely as can be,
so I'm gonna ride into town
for a real spendin' spree.
I'll visit Sue a time or two
and spend some time in bars.
I'll eat some meals in Mom's Cafe
and smoke some fine cigars.
I'll be in town a week or so,
'til all my money's spent,
then I'll come back to this old shack
wonderin' where it went.
Herding cattle isn't
the easiest, most restful, thing in the world. So, when evening
comes and it isn't your turn to be on watch, it's great
just to kick back and rest a while.
When the day is done
and the herd's at rest
and first watch is on the line,
then the boys kick back
to rest for a while,
as the stars begin to shine.
When their chow is ate
and they've rolled their own
and the cards are all laid out,
they begin to play
and they fan the breeze
to speak of tomorrow's route.
When the game is done
and the fire burns low
and talk has faded away,
the bedroll's laid out
and quiet pervades,
it's the endin' of the day.
When the day is done
and all are at rest,
a great sense of peace prevails,
and the cowboy feels
as he drops to sleep,
his love for these western trails.
This poem was prompted by
a wonderful photograph taken by Max Burke, an Idaho photographer,
when he made a winter visit to Yellowstone Park where the buffalo
seemed magically to appear from the snowy mist.
The herd plods through the Yellowstone,
lone remnants of the past,
whited out by the swirling snows,
backs to the winter's blast.
The snowy trail is ill defined,
great horned bulls lead the way,
protective of the cows and calves,
watchful for those that stray.
Grand beasts of prehistoric times,
the life of native men,
offering up their very selves
each day and then again.
'Twas not so very long ago,
their numbers beyond count,
they faced a great unending foe,
odds near beyond surmount.
The natives thanked the buffalo
for givin' up their lives,
but, as outsiders reaped the herd,
man, not beast, survives.
But somehow they are living still
within this lone retreat,
nosing through snow for sustenance,
accepting no defeat.
An experiential violation
some of my own biases. Inspired by a classic poem first published
in 1842 as a modern freeform poet might write the first verse of
it. The smithy was common in the small towns where I lived or
boarded to go to school and Longfellow's poem, "The
Village Smithy," provided a grand description of the
business. While in the 9th grade in Anselmo, Nebraska in 1942, I
took a blacksmithing segment of shop and it was a valuable and
interesting experience which I found useful on the ranches where
I worked. The classic poem is:
The Village Smithy
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Under a spreading chestnut-tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.
vegetative masses
play games with sunlit skies
growing
psyche somehow enhanced
in search of verity
dreaming
brawn beyond Eden's clay
strengthened by endeavor
toiling
In the old days,
youngsters often had to quit school to help the family with work
around the home place. They felt there was some logic to that
because lessons were not directly related to the work that needed
to be done.
Hank managed to get through grade three
then quit goin' to school,
not one of the things they taught there
was a good ranchin' tool.
Any fool could sure count a herd
and tally on a stick,
with just a stick and a sharp knife,
countin' was pretty quick.
You can't rope no cows with spellin',
you gotta understand,
so a cowboy don't need to spell
to be a good ranch hand.
Readin' was a real exception,
a good thing for long nights
when snow lays deep across the hills,
the mind can take grand flights.
But hist'ry, that was somethin' else,
intriguin' 'though it was,
it was simply unrelated
to what a cowboy does.
They don't teach how to brand a cow,
or treat a calf with scours,
or to tend a horse that's foundered,
or use your daytime hours.
There ain't no class on cuttin' horns,
or vaccinatin' stock,
or harvestin' mountain oysters,
or patchin' up your sock.
So Hank just reckoned he'd cut out
and become a cowboy,
to do the work he liked the best
t'was somethin' he'd enjoy.
Growing up in the Great
Depression and seeing the impact of that coupled with a major
drought can certainly influence a persons life. The impression
that lingers in my mind is that, despite everything, there always
seemed to be hope for tomorrow.
Beneath an up-turned fingernail moon,
a moon which promised no rain,
the rancher stood alone.
He knew that needed rain must come soon,
his entire herd felt the pain,
the land, dry as a stone.
But he'd heard before, this desert tune,
the dry winds in his domain,
their hot, dry helpless tone.
There was a promise, maybe by noon,
there could be some hint of rain,
he stood there, all alone.
As you get older seems
like you start looking back a bit more. And, in doing that, you
marvel at all the changes which have occurred over the
years...like the daily paper now delivered at 5:00am! Even when
we were getting a daily paper, likely as not we'd get it a
day late.
Damn, you're complainin' again,
there ain't no cause for that,
you shoulda lived the life I lived
back there along the Platte.
We didn't have autombiles,
we didn't patch no tires,
our horsepower had four legs
to meet trav'lin' desires.
Our newspaper came ev'ry month,
that did seem quite enough,
and we looked forward to readin'
about all kinds a stuff.
We never did go a shoppin'
like you folks do today,
we was always self-sufficient
and made do ev'ry day.
Food didn't come in frozen bags,
or in tin cans too much,
ma canned it up in Mason jars
that she kept in the hutch.
I kept my six-gun right handy,
but never killed no one,
'twas just to scare off bigger guys
that I could not outrun.
We didn't have no home mortgage,
our house was made of sod,
and the few things that we enjoyed
all seemed like gifts from God.
There's lots more than that, I reckon,
but, boy, you understand,
you ain't got cause for no complaint
'til you've lived off the land.
Times were really tough
during The Great Depression of the 1930's and life was
complicated by a severe, lingering drought in parts of the
country. Jobs were scarce, money was scarce, banks were closing,
and main street was deserted. Yet, people held hope in their
hearts for a better tomorrow.
"Mom's Cafe" in faded letters,
on a listless grey sign
squeaking in the gusty, dry wind,
inviting folks to dine.
The blue-plate special, sixty cents,
and coffee five cents more,
all that a hungry man could eat
just through that cafe door.
On wood benches outside the door,
men waited helplessly
waiting, for what they did not know,
their eyes, a silent plea.
Gaunt faces reflecting hunger,
life, seeming so unfair,
delaying a return to home,
to face their fam'lies there.
With few pennies in their pockets
men could but sit outside,
just waiting there for God knows what,
stripped of their manly pride.
From arid fields out to the west,
wind born dust filled the air,
dimming the light of mid-day's sun,
a grey cloud of despair.
Dust-filled clouds above boiled and rolled,
offering no relief
to dirt and heat and endless days,
to soothe them in their grief.
Yet within those eyes a spark shone,
hope, yes, for tomorrow.
Things were bound to be better then
to ease this time of woe.
This sort of happened
years ago in Dunning, Nebraska. A feller had a new Model-T and,
on Halloween night, that Tin Lizzy wound up on the roof of the
lumber yard. The lesson seems to be, don't brag too much or
somebody's apt to get even with you.
That Model T was quite a sight
but it didn't fit in,
it backfired and scared the horses
and made a frightful din.
Sam'd bought that Lizzy in town
with a smile on his face,
he thought he'd made a real good deal
and drove it to our place.
He seemed pretty snooty to us,
braggin' about that car,
and he kept that up the whole day
like a sea-goin' tar.
Well, when night came us bunkhouse boys
came up with a good thought
to take care of the noise and fumes
made by that car Sam bought.
We just disassembled that thing
in the dark of the night
and reassembled it on the barn roof,
chucklin' at old Sam's plight.
When Sam got up the next mornin'
he was a sight to see,
his new car way up on the roof
and us laughin' with glee.
With our help, he got the car down
and he drove right away
and 'cause we'd got the best of him,
he'd nothin' more to say.