Paul Albert Bell

El Reno, Oklahoma, USA

Farm life, dust bowl days, depression and drought in my teen years leaves me thinking of the dirty thirties when life was all work and no play. After High School it was the Navy, Philippines, Corregidor, and Japanese P.O.W. camps for three and one half years. At war's end I married and became the father of two beautiful daughters who have been the light of my life ever since. Went to college on the G.I. bill of rights and earned a B.S. and a M.S. in Agriculutre, this was a wonderful time in my life. I have had a very successful career and now at seventy seven I am pleased to relive these experiences in poetry.

A Cowboy Soldier

I can see a soldier's mother
Knitting quietly in the lamplight,
Her precious thoughts are for another
Who has been sent away to fight.
She is remembering a tousled haired boy
Running through the house to play.
She is remembering the heartfelt joy
Of washing and nurturing him each day.
She gloried in his every little achievement
For he was her flesh and blood.
It was only temporary bereavement
When he would come in covered with mud.
Sometimes he rode a stick horse
All over a vast front yard range.
He was rounding up cattle of course
Every detail he took care to arrange.
Somtimes he rode till it was night
Searching this range for his cattle.
He was never far from his mother's sight
For she loved watching him ride high in the saddle.
These were the magnificent glory years
Of a tousled haired boy and his mother.
As she knitted she saw through her tears
A mighty little cowboy unlike any other.
Now he has gone down to the battle
To fight for his country and his home.
But he has not forgotten the front yard cattle
And the mighty range he used to roam.
With the bursting of every bomb and shell
He remembers those who loved him so.
He remembers his mother's supper yell
And her precious face that would always glow.
She was a broken hearted mother
When this cowboy soldier never made it home.
She thought her heart would smother
As she knelt in prayer on the range he used to roam.
There wasn't any fine oration
There wasn't any beautiful song.
This boy had met his obligation
And he stood above the throng.
Today I believe this cowboy is exploring
The range in his new home.
I believe our precious Lord is adoring
A cowboy who has a brand new range to roam.