Our lives are hid; our trails are strange; We're scattered through the West In canyon cool, on blistered range Or windy mountain crest. Wherever Nature drops her ears And bares her claws to scratch, From Yuma to the north frontiers, You'll likely find the bach', You will, The shy and sober bach'! Our days are sun and storm and mist, The same as any life, Except that in our trouble list We never count a wife. Each has a reason why he's lone, But keeps it 'neath his hat; Or, if he's got to tell some one, Confides it to his cat, He does, Just tells it to his cat. We're young or old or slow or fast, But all plumb versatyle. The mighty bach' that fires the blast Kin serve up beans in style. The bach' that ropes the plungin' cows Kin mix the biscuits true— We earn our grub by drippin' brows And cook it by 'em too, We do, We cook it by 'em too. We like to breathe unbranded air, Be free of foot and mind, And go or stay, or sing or swear, Whichever we're inclined. An appetite, a conscience clear, A pipe that's rich and old Are loves that always bless and cheer And never cry nor scold, They don't. They never cry nor scold. Old Adam bached some ages back And smoked his pipe so free, A-loafin' in a palm-leaf shack Beneath a mango tree. He'd best have stuck to bachin' ways, And scripture proves the same, For Adam's only happy days Was 'fore the woman came, They was, All 'fore the woman came. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AD LESBIAM by GAIUS VALERIUS CATULLUS AFTER MUSIC by JOSEPHINE PRESTON PEABODY IN MEMORIAM A.H.H.: 47 by ALFRED TENNYSON WAYCONNELL TOWER by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM TO SWEET MEAT, SOUR SAUCE; AN IMITATION OF THEOCRITUS OR ANACREON by PHILIP AYRES WALKEN HWOME AT NIGHT by WILLIAM BARNES THE SONG OF THE COSSACK by PIERRE JEAN DE BERANGER ZILLEBEKE BROOK by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN ELEGY ON A LADY, WHOM GRIEF FOR THE DEATH OF HER BETHROTHED KILLED by ROBERT SEYMOUR BRIDGES |