Classic Poem

OLIVER West came riding down;
His face was lean and keen and brown,
And his eyes were fixed on the desert town
At the end of the Sunset Trail.

Without the ghost of a good excuse,
He set his spurs in his roan cayuse,
“Lay to it, Sarko! Cut her loose!”
And the pebbles flew like hail.

“Hi! Yip! I can hear the silver strings,
And the song that the little Bonita sings;
Say, Sarko, I wish that your feet were wings,
But you're doin' your best, all right!”

The sun rolled down to the western range,
And he watched the shadows shift and change,
And the little lights of the town looked strange
As they beckoned across the night.

An hour—and he clinked to the doorway glare
Of the 'dobe. The singing girl was there,
With a southern rose in her midnight hair,
And lips like a bud of June.

“Onda, La Onda,” the song began,
As softly the silver music ran
To the heart of the swart El Capitan,
'T was the Gringo lover's tune.

The little Bonita saw and smiled,
With the pouting lips of a teasing child;
She loved—but the Gringo was not beguiled;
'T was a heart that she could not tame.

A word—and the swell of the music broke;
The room was a pit of flame and smoke,
But Oliver West not a word he spoke,
As into the night he came.

Then with more than the ghost of a good excuse,
He set his spurs in his roan cayuse;
“Lay to it, Sarko! Hell 's broke loose!”
And the pebbles flew like hail.

“Onda, La Onda's a right good song,”
Said Oliver West as he loped along;
“Was it he or she or me done wrong?
Well, she's there—and I'm here, and we're goin' strong,
Back over the Sunset Trail.”