Accidental Hero Poem by David Welch

The day Mitchell Malden became a hero
he had only meant to go for a drink,
paced slowly into Slimbed's only saloon,
where he noticed an unpleasant stink.

He saw Delaney Hannigan at cards
and figured that explained the bad smell,
that rustler spent his days out in the bush,
scum like him never did come off well.

He only came to town to spend stolen loot,
and for some reason the man liked to play,
Mitch himself could not understand why,
the fool just lost all his cash in the games.

So Mitch ignored him, enjoyed his drink,
tasted fine after a day running cows,
then came a loud roar, and angry howl:
"You damned cheats, throw those guns down right now! "

The poker table then crashed, upended,
Mitch look back, saw Delaney with a gun,
"I'm tired of this bar stealing my coin,
so y'all put your hands up, everyone! "

For a moment nobody dared a move,
Al knew Delany was the type to kill,
Nobody else had a pistol drawn
So they coolly acquiesced to his will.

Delaney stalked closer, saw Mitch's old colt,
said, "Listen close and you'll suffer no harm.
You take that iron out of that gunbelt
and you lay it down real nice on the bar."

Mitchel did what the bandit desired,
there was no other way he could figure,
but Mitch's hand shook, and when he put it down
his finger brushed back against the trigger.

The gun fired as it touched the bar-top,
the slug pierced Delaney's big forehead,
he pitched backwards, the folks looking on,
when he hit the ground he was stone dead.

A moment of stunned silence fell on them,
then came a storn of folk shaking his hand.
"Making that cool think you would go alone…
Now that there's the play of a clever man! "

Mitch was stunned, but he said not a word,
just let the procession bring him to the street,
soon all of the town knew of his brave deed
and heralded this heroic feet.

The newspapers even picked up the tale,
earning Mitch a good measure of fame,
soon enough he found himself the mayor,
and got a pretty girl to take his name.

All though he was the smartest gunfighter,
and all his life he was a sensation,
the bar where this happened still stands today,
visited by folk across the whole nation.

It's only I, his great-great-great grandson,
who knows the truth of what happened back then,
but who am I to tell it like it was
when everybody does so love the legend?