Poetry Archives

When walkin’ down a city street,
   Two thousand miles from home,
The pavestones hurtin’ of the feet
   That never ought to roam,
A pony jest reached to one side
   And grabbed me by the clothes;
He smelled the sagebrush, durn his hide—
   You bet a pony knows!

I stopped and petted him, and seen
   A brand upon his side;
I’ll bet across the prairie green
   He useter hit his stride;
Some puncher of the gentle cow
   Had owned him—that I knows;
Which same is why he jest says: “How!
   There’s sagebrush in your clothes.”

He knowed the smell—no doubt it waked
   Him out of some bright dream;
In some far stream his thirst is slaked—
   He sees the mountains gleam;
He bears his rider far and fast,
   And real the bull thing grows
When I come sorter driftin’ past
   With sagebrush in my clothes.

Poor little hoss! It’s tough to be
   Away from that fair land—
Away from that wide prairie sea
   With all its vistas grand;
I feel for you, old hoss, I do—
   It’s hard the way life goes;
I’d like to travel back with you—
   Back where that sagebrush grows!