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"Call the wrangler in from nightherd.
Fetch a log to feed the blaze.
While you boil a pot of coffee
Ill remember better days.
"Make the bell mare stop her jingle.
Still the coyotes lonely song.
Listen while I tell you, fellers,
Bout the gal who did me wrong.
"Quiet down the camp cooks clanging
Tell the hood to rest a spell.
Pull your soogins near the fire and
Listen close to what I tell."
Glad they were to stop their chorin.
Some of them took out a chew;
Others passed around the makins,
Wonderin what an old man knew.
"In my youth I was," he started,
"Much more than the man you see:
Hightop boots and hand-carved saddle
No one sat a horse like me!
Got a job a-breakin horses.
Took to it right naturally;
Rode the bad ones to a standstill.
Nothing was too tough for me.
"Young and strong, I craved adventure,
Driven by some hidden force.
Every day my life was rode hard,
Put up wet with no remorse.
"Saturdays wed turn the wolf loose,
Ride to town and dance all night,
Woo the town folks lovely daughters,
Get back home before first light.
"Then one day I met a girl with
Long brown hair and sparkling eyes.
From the first she said she loved me,
Figured she had won the prize.
"Boys, I lost my head so quickly,
Fell for her in every way;
Told her all the dreams I carried,
Told her all Id be one day.
"She agreed with every item,
Said my dreams were her dreams, too.
Said shed share my evry notion;
She convinced me shed be true.
"Years passed by, and dreams went with them.
She forgot the plans I had.
With those dreams, a part of me died;
What was good turned into bad.
"Fellers, you should heed my lesson,
Lest you meet my bitter end.
Fore you take a girl to marry,
Better make her first your friend."
Grief had filled his sad old eyes and
Turned his face an ashen gray.
Finally, he said, "Im finished,"
Heaved a sigh, and walked away.
Copyright ©2003 Dale E. Page. All rights reserved.
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