The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-06-12
Lasca used to ride

Lasca used to ride
On a mouse-gray mustang close by my side,
With blue serape and bright beled spur;
i laughed with JOY as looked at her!
Little she knew of books or OF creeds;
An Ave Maria sufficed her needs;
Little she cared, save to be by my side,
To ride with me, and ever to ride,
From San Saba's shore to Lavaca's tide.
She as bold as the pillows that beat,
She was as wild as the breezes that blow;
From her little head to her little feet
She was swayed in her suppleness to and fro
By each gust OF passion; a sapling pine,
That grows on the edge of Kansas bluff,
And wars with the winds when the weather Is
rough,
Is like this Lasca, this love of mine.
She would hunger that might eat,
Would take the bitter and leave me the sweet;
But once, when made her jealous for fun,
At something I'd whispered. or looked, or done,
One sunday, in San Antonio,
To glorious girl on the Alamo,
She drew from her garter dear little dagger!
Adjusting of a wasp!-it made me stagger!
An inch to the left, or an inch to the night,
And shouldn't be Numbering here tonight;
But she sobbed, ana, sobbing, so swiftly bound
Her torn reboso about the wound
That quite forgave her. Scratches don't count
In Texas, down by the Rio Grande.
Her eye was brown--a deep, deep brown:
Her hair was darker than her eye;
And something in her smile and frowu,
Curled crimson lip and iustep high,
Showed that there ran in each blue vein,
Mixed with the milder Aztec strain,
The vi yorous vintage OF Old Spain.
She was alive in every limb
With feeling, to the finger tips;
And when the sun is like fire,
And the sky one shining, soft sapphire,
One does not drink in little sips.
The air was heavy. the night was hot
] sat By her side, and forgot-iorgot:
Forgot the herd that were taking their rest,
Forgot that the air was close opprest,
That the Texas norther comes sudden aud soon,
In the dead of night or the blaze of noon:
That once let the herd at its breath take fright,
Nothing on earth can stop its flight;
And woe to the rider, and woe to the steed,
Who falls in front of their mad stampede.
Was that thunder? I grasped the cord
OF my swift mustang without word.
/ sprang To the saddle and she clu ng behind.
Away, on a hot chase down the wind.
But never was fox hunt half so hard,
And never was steed so little spared,
For we rode for our lives You shall hear how
We Jared,
In Texas. down by the Rio Grande
The mustang few. and we urged him on:
There was one chance left and you have but one:
Halt, jump to the ground and shoot your horse.
Crouch under his carcass and take your
chance;
And if the steers in their frantic course
Don't batter you both 10 pieces at once,
You may thank your star; If not, good-by
To the quickening kiss and the long drawn
And the open air and tnesopen sky,
In Texas. down by the Rio G,ande!
The cattle gained on US, and just as felt
For my old six-shooter behind in my belt,
Down came the mustang, and down came we,
Clinging together. and-what was the rest?
A body that spread itself on my breast.
Two arms that shielded my dizzy head,
Two lips that hard on my lips We're prest;
Then came thunder in my ears,
AS over us surged the sea OF steers
Bows that beat blood into my eyes.
And when coulc rise
Lasca was dead!
gouged out grave few feet deep,
And there in Earth's arms laid her 10 sleep;
And there she is lying, and no one knows:
AS the summer shines, and the winter SHOWS
For many a day the flowers have spread
A pail o. petals over her head:
And the little gray haw2 hangs aloit in the air,
And the sly coyote trots here and there,
And the blacksaake glides and gitters and
slides
Into rift in q cottonwood tree;
And the buzzard sails on,
And comes and IS gone,
stately and still ike ship at sea;
And wonder why do rot care
For the things that are like the things that were
Does half nv heart lie buried there
In Texas, down by the BIO Grande:
Thomas p. ochitree