I've been off of the internet and haven't written any poems for a long time. Recently, I had occasion to review some of my old web site files and I chanced upon the last poem that I had written...Westward Ho, The Wagons Rolled. It had  long since been forgotten. I liked it; and it inspired the first poem that I have written in about three years, My Pretty Patch Of Green.   Featured are these two poems.

Last Chance Or Bust  by Charles Russell 

 Westward Ho, Their Wagons Rolled

Stark and primitive, it loomed
in wild, primeval glory...
no province yet- this land they trod-
but just a territory.
They wondered in the wilderness,
assailable, alone....
a planet-breadth away
from all the world they'd ever known....
a land so rawboned... rugged....
that the states back East seemed tame.
Common sense said, "Turn around!
Go back from where y' came."

Then echoed back a sun bleached skull
that leered up from the range,
"This land's not meant for such as you...
too merciless and strange.
Just look around.....there's no place here
for fools the likes a' you.
This land'll break those hearts a'  yours
before your journey's through."
Then  from the orbits that were eyes,
there slithered out a snake.
It warned them, "Better men than you,
this land's been known t' break."

But then, beyond the coiling snake...
beyond the skulls that leered...
beyond the hoary scrags of sage...
a patch of green appeared.
A verdant stretch of meadow grass-
a tonic sip of green-
and Westward Ho...their spirits soared
and raised their sagging dream.
A waving stand of knee-high hope
on which their dream could graze.....
a vision there of things to come
on which their eyes could gaze.
Westward Ho...their wagons rolled
through terrors yet unseen,
driven by the promise of
that pretty patch of green.

Bette Wolf Duncan
 copyright2000

My Pretty Patch of Green
 
 Full of rocks, the ground around-
 with little fertile soil-
 and only random well-worn paths
 carved out of years of toil….
 with fields around choked up with weeds
 and crops, starvation lean…
 this you were to me, my love-
 my pretty patch of green.
 
 And all was oh so verdant
 on my pretty patch of green.
 A stream nearby hummed all day long,
 sibilant, serene.
 Birds were singing, flowers bloomed,
 as long as you were there.
 And oh, my pretty patch of green
 was all so very fair.
 
 But now no rain, since you’ve been gone,
 upon the earth’s parched crust-
 and all around the dried-up scrags
 are filmed with gritty dust.
 And when the whipping, dust-filled winds
 sweep merciless and mean,
 my love, I think of you and miss
 my pretty patch of green.
 
 Bette Wolf Duncan
 copyright 2005
(Dedicated to Bill Duncan 1925 - 2002)