Dusty

BY DR. AGONSON

Dusty and saddle-worn, I always was. Never much cotton to stick’n to one place for very long. My feet get itchy, and I got to move. Comes down to it, though, a man’s gotta stand. You saw me. I stood when it was right. Now time’s finally come round, not to stand, not to run; it’ll be a sort of change, I reckon. I’ll go to the hunting grounds, or the dirt, or maybe there’s a heaven. It’s just, I ain’t too partial to the idea of lying in a hole in the ground. So, sirs, that’s all I’ll ask:

If y’re fixing on hanging me, hang me. What I did, I did. I’ll answer to God for that. Maybe He’ll see things my way, maybe yours, but I won’t try to hide. I didn’t run from you. Can’t from Him. I’m old, and in these hard years I’ve learned you can’t hide nothing, all said and done. But I’m a wandering man, and if y’re fixing, after I’m done kicking, on planting me up there on Boot hill, I’d ask you, in good Christian charity, not to. I am meant to roam, to be free, not buried in dirt.

My grandpappy was a preacher man, and he read much. He read me Bible as a young’un, and also some of ’em old legends too. I rather loved hearing ’em tales of Heracles. A man like Sampson, I think. They both fought a lion. I shot a few cougars myself. Heracles did wrong too, and paid for it, like Sampson did. When it was time for Heracles to die, they burned his body, grandpappy said, and he went to heaven. Showed me in the stars where he’s kneeling. He’s kneeling but roaming too, cause the heavens are turning above us.

I reckon that’s all the more I’ve got to say, and I thanks you for hearing me. I never thought I’d get out of life alive. Leastways, grandpappy taught me we all got to die sometime, and I’ve seen, when a fellow’s got to go, he’s got to go. Ain’t no ways ’round that. If I was a sailor now, tain’t be no problem burying me out to sea, so think of it like that. I belong to the desert, and I simply ask you to return me to her. Let my ashes rejoin the sands and wastes they know.