Several years ago, there was a picture on the Bar D Ranch cowboy poetry website's Art Spur project. The website, http://www.cowboypoetry.com/,
publishes a painting as a way to get the poetic juices flowing. If you go to this link, http://www.cowboypoetry.com/jhildebrandt.htm, and scroll down you'll see the picture right before you come to the section on books I've written. Sorry, but I can't remember who did the art work. There’s a lot written about the glory days of the cattle drives. Movies like Red River and TV shows such as Rawhide glorified the trail driving cowboy. But award winning cowboy singer, Bill Barwick often says, "Unless you’re the lead cow, the view never changes." That is what I was thinking as I wrote the following poem based on the art work. If you don't want to go to the trouble of linking to the other web sites, just imagine a cattle drive.
Dust 'N Tails
“There’s beauty in the rangeland
where the grassy prairies roll
and the glistening dew of morning
sends a smile right through your soul.
There’s beauty in the azure sky
when the sun begins to rise
and the scope of God’s great glory
brings a tear to cowboy’s eyes.
It’s wonderful they tell me
while trying not to brag
cause all I see are Dust ‘n Tails
from back here riding drag.”
Jeff Hildebrandt copyright 2004
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Some folks see nothin' but dust 'n tails everywhere they go: even off the range and away from the cattle. I find more and more that its all about perspective.
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