LEST THEY HUNKER DOWN
They rode west. They left spires and towns in their wake.
Backroom bar-deals and cemetery boots were what they'd
subscribed to along the way - the cost was the dues they'd
have to pay : hangings at dawn, lynching parties and posse-
parties, dragging the hombre through town on a rope.
The dust made circles in the air as they dragged this guy along.
Eventually his dead pulpy body made red-rag splotches
along the hard-caked dirt-soil roadway - right past the
saloon and the barber's, the doctor's and the jailhouse.
No one said a word - they just stared at the action and
wondered 'what's next?'
This was how it happened - the lumberyard had the
wood for the box in which they'd bury him. Boot Hill
and all the rest - like nails in a coffin, time in a bottle,
never looking back, riding at dawn and all those
forlorn and caustic cowboy sayings.
'Lest they hunker down, boys, let's shoot 'em
where they live.'
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