Slow Smoke/Dynamite

by Lew Sarett

DYNAMITE

Outlaw they brand you, killer, bucking fool,
Because you spurn the hackamore and cinch;
The round-up wranglers wait with eager heart
The moment of your fall: your steel-curbed mouth
Running a rill of blood, your back worn raw
By saddle sticking like a cocklebur,
Your wild heart, broken by the quirt, subdued.

O bronco, whose will is set against the will
Of the multitude, as taut as any bowstring,
Know that another outcast will exult
If the free-born one shall pitch the sovereign many
Over the rim of sky and into darkness. . . .

Beware!—the burlap that they strive to fling
About your head to blind you! the velvet hands
They clamp upon your ears, your quivering mouth!
Or you will run the range to-morrow servile,
Shattered of soul as any mongrel cur.

Beware! They come! Let fly your molten heels!
Double and snort and twist! Rain down your hoofs
Of crackling thunderbolts upon the ground!
For every sweep of spur from neck to flank,
Hurtle your rider skyward, rake his head
Upon the pointed stars, and heave him sprawling
Over the moon and down to earth again.

Oh, beautiful!—the wild heart pounding, free!
The flames of hell triumphant in your eyes!
As lovely your electric flesh careering,
As galloping cloud and lightning-flash, your kin,
The wild unfettered horses of the sky.

Well done! Well done! O bronco, run! Run!
Streaming the velvet banners of your mane,
Run free again; back to the comradeship
Of cantering rain and nickering waterfalls,
To your mountain solitude where thin blue winds
Whinny among the pines and crop the grasses.
And wait for me, O bronco, wait for me there.