Charles Badger Clark Poems

You've watched the ground-hog's shadow and the shiftin' weather signs
Till the Northern prairie starred itse'f with flowers;
You've seen the snow a-meltin' up among the Northern pines
And the mountain creeks a-roarin' with the showers.
...

My tired horse nickers for his own home bars;
A hoof clicks out a spark.
The dim creek flickers to the lonesome starts;
The trail twists down the dark.
...

Desert blue and silver in the still moonshine,
Coyote yappin' lazy on the hill,
Sleepy winks of lightnin' down the far sky line,
Time for millin' cattle to be still.
...

When my trail stretches out to the edge of the sky
Through the desert so empty and bright,
When I'm watchin' the miles as they go crawlin' by
And a-hopin' I'll get there by night,
...

At a roundup on the Gily,
One sweet mornin' long ago,
Ten of us was throwed right freely
By a hawse from Idaho.
...

There is some that like the city—
Grass that's curried smooth and green,
Theaytres and stranglin' collars,
Wagons run by gasoline—
...

Wrangle up your mouth-harps, drag your banjo out,
Tune your old guitarra till she twangs right stout,
For the snow is on the mountains and the wind is on the plain,
But we'll cut the chimney's moanin' with a livelier refrain.
...

Wonder why I feel so restless;
Moon is shinin' still and bright,
Cattle all is restin' easy,
But I just kain't sleep tonight.
...

God of the open, though I am so simple
Out in the wind I can travel with you,
noons when the hot mesas ripple and dimple,
Nights when the stars glitter cool in the blue.
...

When the dreamers of old Coronado,
From the hills where the heat ripples run,
Made a dust to the far Colorado
And wagged their steel caps in the sun,
...