Cowboy   Some say the cowboy is a gallant breed, silent and leather tough Others say he's a fable created from Hollywood fluff who was, and is, this "people" we have heard about for years? a folk hero known as "cowboy" for whom some shed tears   The answer isn't simple because his image has morphed through time as soon as he was riding the range stories were sold for a dime dramatic tension was needed to make these tales get sold so "cowboy" began it's journey fitting each generations mold   was "cowboy" some wide eyed kid on the dodge? Whose parents "beat him everyday" making him dislodge Running to a cow camp where he'd hire on to learn to drive cattle up the trail and carefully brands to burn   Whether Mexican, Indian, Black or White they came for the job and the good ones with a saddle.. were culled from the mob   to work for low pay and long hours.. some just for a short time some stove up by conditions that gave rise to poetic rhyme   dull days and short nights filled with work to the bone no music or bad guys just dumb luck when you're thrown or the fact he didn't own silk shirts sewn with white fringe this "cowboy" was real and how he died made some cringe   But was he a handsome loner that helped right the wrong Or a hard drinking son of a bitch who could never get along? Somewhere between the East and West a cowboy we can see A person back then with no school, but now maybe has a degree   It's like being in a house of mirrors a different reflection each day Modest, hard working families who aren't guaranteed much pay Or a rodeo cowboy driving for miles to have a chance at the NFR Or folks in a movie or on a stage telling tales of the west from afar   the "purists" might say you ain't cowboy if you ain't born to it But "cowboy" is personal to most no matter where you might sit   However you see "cowboy" Éthey indeed are a part of it all As necessary as anything else that America puts on her wall

©Steve Dirksen