More or Less Bein'

Those of you in the western entertainment industry...I don't know if it can be called "industry" or not. Western entertainment is mostly independent contractors scratching and scrambling to make ends meet. It seems to me that western entertainers spend their time trying to get hired at events that don't pay them enough to cover expenses, let alone turn a profit. My friend, Bill Barwick, told me when I first started going to these events that promised no money but a lot of exposure, "You can get all the exposure you can afford." But I digress. Anyway, there was a joke circulating a few years ago that I decided to turn into this poem.

More or Less Bein’

An old cowhand sat at the bar
the way old cowhands do.
His mind is off to somewheres else,
his hand’s wrapped round a brew.
When a lady sat beside him
and looked him up and down
from spurs to chaps to cowboy hat
with a feather in the crown.
“Are you a real cowboy”? she asked.
He said, “I s’pose so mam.
I worked on ranches all my life.
So, yes, I guess I am”.
“How ‘bout you?” he says to her
and drains his bottle dry.
“I’m a lesbian” she tells him
and proceeds to ex-plain why.
“I think of women all the time
from dawn to days last light
and then, as if that’s not enough,
I dream of them at night.”
He’s lost in thought as she moves on.
He asks for one more round
when a couple see the way he’s dressed
and both just set on down.
“Are you a real Cowboy”? they asked.
He sighed and then he said,
“I though I was but now I find
I’m a lesbian instead.”

Jeff Hildebrandt copyright 2002