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Bill Venero

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    Bill Venero

    By anonymous | Cowboy Poetry | 0 comment | 16 February, 2017 | 0

    Bill Venero heard them say
    In an Arizona town one day
    That a band of Apache Indians
    Were up on the trail that way
    Heard them tell of murder done
    Three men killed at Rocky Run
    “They’re in danger at the cow-ranch”
    Said Venero under his breath.

    The cow-ranch, forty miles away
    Was a little place that lay
    In a deep and shady valley of the mighty wilderness;
    Half a score of homes were there
    And in one a maiden fair
    Held the heart of Bill Venero: Bill Venero’s Little Bess.

    So no wonder he grew pale
    When he heard the settler’s tale
    Of the men that he’d seen murdered yesterday at Rocky Run.
    “Sure as there’s a God above
    I will save the girl I love,
    By my love for little Bessie I will see that something’s done.”

    Not a moment he delayed
    When his brave resolve was made
    “Why, man,” his comrades told him when they heard of his daring plan,
    “You are riding straight to death.”
    But he answered, “Save your breath,
    I may never reach the cow-ranch, but I’ll do the best I can.”

    As he crossed the alkali
    All his thoughts flew on ahead
    To the little band at cow-ranch not of danger near;
    With his quirt’s unceasing whirl
    And the jingle of his spurs
    Little brown Chapo bore the cowboy o’er the far-away frontier.

    Lower and lower sank the sun;
    He drew rein at Rocky Run.
    “Here those men met death, my Chapo” — and he stroked his glossy mane.
    “So will those we got to warn
    Ere the coming of the morn
    If we fail — God help my Bessie.” And he started on again.

    Sharp and clear a rifle shot
    Woke the echoes of the spot
    “I am wounded,” cried Venero, as he swayed from side to side.
    “While there’s life there’s always hope;
    Slowly onward I will lope–
    If I fail to reach the cow-ranch, Bessie Lee shall know I tried.”

    “I will save her yet,” he cried.
    “Bessie Lee shall know I tried.”
    And for her sake then he halted in the shadow of the hill;
    From his buckskin shirt he took
    With weak hands a little book;
    Tore a blank leaf from its pages saying, “This shall be my will.”

    From a limb a pen he broke,
    And he dipped his pen of oak
    In the warm blood that was spurting from a wound above his heart.
    :Rouse,” he wrote before too late.
    “Apache warriors lie in wait.
    Good-by, Bess, God bless you darling,” and he felt the cold tears start.

    Then he made his message fast,
    Love’s first message and its last;
    To the saddle horn he tied it, and his lips were white with pain.
    “Take this message, if not me,
    Straight to little Bessie Lee.”
    Then he leaned down in the saddle and clutched the sweaty mane.

    Just at dusk a horse of brown
    Wet with sweat came panting down
    The little lane at cow-ranch, stopped in front of Bessie’s door;
    But the cowboy was asleep
    And his slumber was so deep
    Little Bess could never wake him though she tried for evermore.

    You have heard the story told
    By the young and by the old
    Away down yonder at the cow-ranch the night the Apaches came;
    Of that sharp and bloody fight,
    How the chief fell in the flight
    Of the panic-stricken warriors when they heard Venero’s name.

    In an awed and reverent way
    As men utter, “Let us pray,”
    As we speak the name of heroes thinking how they lived and died
    So the heavens and earth between
    Keep a little flower green
    That little Bess had planted ere they laid her by his side.

     

    Image by W.H. Ford

    Bess, Bill Venero, Brave, dead, horse, love

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