Bronc to Breakfast calendars hang fading on the walls There’s a lost and aimless wandering through the corridors and halls Of slippered feet that shuffle on a waxed and polished floor And vacant stares of emptiness from the men who ride no more Men who once rode proudly—men with long straight backs Men who covered hill and plain with steel shod horses tracks Now pass their idle days in rooms with numbers on the door With orderlies and nurses for men who ride no more Time was when spur rowels jingled when boot heels bumped the floor Dawns with hot black coffee and saddling up at four With feet in tapaderos and broncs between their knees And silken neck scarves snapping as they turned into the breeze From full-blown living legends true to riding for the brand To the scarcely mediocre who could hardly make a hand They would gather for the branding or the shipping in the Fall Now it’s walker, cane, and wheelchair in the antiseptic hall And they all have their mementos on the table by their side Like a cracked and fading snapshot of a horse they usta ride Or standing with the wife beside a thirty-seven Ford A high-heeled boot hooked nonchalant on a muddy running board Just instants frozen from the past that somehow give a clue To who and what they were before their riding days were through Horseback men with horseback rules from horseback days of yore Their one and only wish would be to somehow ride once more To once more rope a soggy calf and drag it to the fire To long-trot for a half a day and see no post or wire To ride a morning circle—catch a fresh one out at noon And trot him in when the day was done to the rising of the moon To put in one more horseback day and have just one more chance To ride home to a pretty wife and drive her to the dance To take her hand and hold her close and waltz across a floor Before the time to join the ranks of men who ride no more. © 1997, Joel Nelson
Posted on: Wed, 09 Jul 2014 12:38:23 +0000
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