Best Wyoming Poems
After the Gold Rush, the lawless boom town went cold
The Emperor of Wyoming broke camp and left
But love will keep him searching for a Heart of Gold
The Needle And the Damage Done left him bereft
The Emperor of Wyoming broke camp and left
The Loner went from Out of the Blue And Into the Black
The Needle And the Damage Done left him bereft
Like a Hurricane, or a train jumped off its tracks
The Loner went from Out of the Blue And Into the Black
Everybody knows This is Nowhere, the Loner weeps,
Like a Hurricane, or a train jumped off its tracks
Danger Bird soars ever higher; his Rust Never Sleeps
Everybody knows This is Nowhere, The Loner weeps,
A real Powderfinger would have a better plan
Danger Bird soars ever higher; his Rust Never Sleeps
But he lost his Cinnamon Girl, his Cowgirl In the Sand
A real Powderfinger would have a better plan
He thinks he’ll just keep on Rockin’ In the Free World
But he lost his Cinnamon Girl, his Cowgirl In the Sand
The Thrasher rolls down the road, Stars and Bars unfurled
He thinks he’ll just keep on Rocking in the Free World
But love will keep him searching for a Heart of Gold
The Thrasher rolls down the road, Stars and Bars unfurled
After the Gold Rush, the lawless boom town went cold
5/19/16
© by author
For contest: Musical Pantoum
Sponsor: Silent One
This poem used the following 15 Neil Young songs:
“After the Gold Rush”
“The Emperor of Wyoming”
“Heart of Gold”
“The Needle And the Damage Done”
“Like a Hurricane”
“The Loner”
“Out of the Blue And Into the Black”
“Everybody knows This is Nowhere”
“Danger Bird”
“Rust Never Sleeps”
“Powderfinger”
“Cinnamon Girl”
“Cowgirl In the Sand”
“Rockin’ In the Free World”
“The Thrasher”
"American Stars and Bars" is also a Neil Young album title...
He's a versatile "man of all trades,"
pursues anything new, virtually self-made.
He's a photographer, a minister and a poet,
immerses himself totally but before you know it
he's off and running, tackling something new
He's built homes, cell towers, churches, boss of the crew.
He publishes books, serves as president of our group
If something's happening he's never out of the loop.
A proud do-it-yourselfer, he repairs whatever breaks,
services cars, saws down trees, no matter what it takes.
He took voice lessons, learned to fly a plane,
changed the course of my life, but let me explain.
He was teaching, after hours, for extra money
"I'm saving this for a big vacation, honey.
We're going to Africa, we're gonna hunt big game
for a mere eight thousand, we'll have anything you name.
At this ranch in S. Africa, the wife's a gourmet cook,
irons your clothes while hubby shows where to look."
He built me a special gun, said I could learn to shoot;
took me to the practice range, bought pricey hunting boots.
I took Mother west to Casper visiting my younger sister.
We stayed four weeks in Wyoming because Mom missed her.
Returning home to Missouri, I was surprised to see
he'd purchased a quarter-share in a Cherokee.
I didn't mind much, after initial fear had waned;
I enjoyed seeing America, flying the skies in that plane.
We moved out of St. Louis away from all the noise
built our "old folks home" with retirement as the ploy.
Another trip to Wyoming alone, without my mate
That Piper 235 is history; I returned, alas, too late.
He'd sold his beloved plane and purchased something new,
a grand New Holland tractor painted blue, with a neon hue.
Now he's mowing ten acres and grading a gravel road,
plowing up the garden, with me sharing the load.
My life changed drastically with all my options gone.
If you plan to hunt in Africa, don't go to Wyoming alone.
You must listen closely now for the most important factor,
that's how my trip to Africa eventually became a tractor.
It’s a Wyoming winter--there’s snowflakes and sleet coming down,
The cowboy is hiding away from the trouble in town.
Now, the gambler he cheated the cowboy of wages,
With cards that he chose to conceal,
So the cowboy he pulled out a pistol and shot it,
And the gambler, he lost his last deal.
Then the cowboy, he rides toward the line-shack and stays there,
While Wyoming winter-winds wail,
Soon the store-keeper’s daughter arrives with provisions,
And a posse that’s close on her trail.
Now the posse gives up and turns back in the blizzard,
While Wyoming winter winds roar,
Then the lovers, they travel from Cheyenne to Denver,
And they marry, and open a store.
It’s a Wyoming winter, there’s snowflakes and sleet coming down,
It’s a Wyoming winter, they’re safe from the trouble in town.
03-27-79
*
open plains,sparse grass
the winter chills,making splash
the news carrie's through
Wyoming sure lacks common sense
To believe in Trump, but not Pence!
A bankrupt and liar
Can prey like a friar
Wyoming is spacious yet dense!
They wait, deep down in the red earth,
covered from the yellow, Wyoming sun,
like Tom Horn, a while ago,
but deeper than he, not the same,
they wouldn’t kill for fun,
and the bored army busies itself beneath;
their mind-numbing repetition unclear,
but the fear, the fear stays, keeping them
on their toes and best behavior
and the specters of the cattle barons, and
rustlers and Geronimo, wonder at these busy
ants underground, eating, sweating, filling in
a thousand forms;
I wonder, do they write poems?
“Here I sit in my rocket-chair, wondering
what’s happening way up there, on the prairie;
while down here, I tick the charts and ponder,
how it would feel to turn the key, turn the key,”
blah, blah, blah….or perhaps they have
chess clubs and baby showers and tense
debating thrills, and Buddy Rich, jazz hours
between the mind-numbing shifts and drills;
and there’s a Slim Pickens, ride- em- cowboy
move still, next to every lady-soldier’s heart,
while another day on the wide-open, God’s gift
prairie passes by;
and up above, in the dawn light, Tom and Geronimo
ride by the metal hatch singing;
“I got you under my skin,”
I see my darling
Why I have chosen to live here
For it is here I will be closer
To you and God and my family, dear.
A man of Wyoming ate cantaloupe
While watching some galloping antelope
To his aunt he said
You must truly wed
A right proper woman just cantaloupe
Somebody said that in Wyoming
That a body could recover from
The N.Y. blues that leave your soul so dry
I bid farewell to Montauk
And the sadness in her eyes
Knowing somehow that I never
Would return.
Now the skies over Green River
Somehow are not that different
And the losing end remains the
losing end.
Some days I'd trade my highway shoes
For a key to the door back home
But the past is smoke
And the locks beneath the clay
I often think of Montauk
Though the photo is all lined now
Knowing somewhere, some days
Montauk thinks of me
Twenty-one years old,
or should I say young,
with the fair coloring and
grace of a trumpeting swan.
Youth of intellect and
a goodness.
He attended an LGBTQ+ meeting
on the campus of the
University of Wyoming on
October 6, 1998,
afterwards he dropped by
the Fireside Bar for a drink.
Two malevolent men lured
him from the bar.
They tortured the youth of
the peaceful presence.
They left him to die on
a deer-proofing fence
near a rural roadside.
Hours later a young man
on a bicycle at first thought
Matthew was a scarecrow,
then recognized him.
He, Matthew of an angelic face.
The swan, the delicate swan.
Tear tracks streamed on his cheeks.
After a six day coma in the hospital,
Matthew of this sad earth passed away.
Candlelight vigils glowed the world over.
Hate crime legislation across the U.S.
was born.
Matthew, a citizen of global humanity,
was murdered for being gay.
Love and Hope lying bereft,
bleeding still.
Matthew's angels still console the
tearful hearts of light,
neverending. ~
The road went straight on
With the ribbon drifting as a heavenly song
They call it the “Road to Heaven” going up high
Stop and look at how it leaves the earth for the sky
So in your wandering take a look to see
I80 in Wyoming in Utah you’ll be.
© Paul Warren Poetry
intense intimate direct
all over art
arrested moments
of
the
energetic flamboyant
purpose filled
flings
a surfeit
of emotional energy
in controlled
abandonment
of space & time
living
the moment
of
the unconscious unwrapped
revealed
in a harmony
of the whole
dip and thrown
vibrant eclectic frantic
vigour
at a fresco scale
in
the giant closeup
a horizontal
becomes
a mural
until
inspiration
evaporates
into
the ephemera
of
selfdoubt
Wyoming is the open road
Miles of light blue sky
Tumble weeds
Cacti
Wyoming is hours and hours
Without seeing other cars
Without seeing animals
Without seeing people
We stopped at a fancy motel there once.
They had the best gift shop.
I bought myself a long brown wool coat
With white galloping horses around the hem.
Wyoming is a state to stop for food
They will leave the light on for you.
Their steaks are fresh and tasty
They make their own condiments
Wyoming is a place to drive through
A place to relax; a state to admire
Their prairie dogs are watching as you drive
But you will neither see them or Wyoming’s buffalo
There is a wrinkle in Wyoming
A sparkling fold in Old Japan
There’s a crease in Alabama
North Carolina has lost a man.
Iowa’s cornfield are all on fire
And Georgia has slipped away in the sea
Bolivia is under siege, feeling dire.
Puerto Rico’s colors have turned gray as can be.
There is a continental divide in Mexico.
A hurricane has flooded most of France.
Turn off the news, my sweetheart.
Let’s hide from the world and dance.
skinny and tall pines
Holy Spirit’s breath winds ‘round
steeples in forest