SUNSET OF THE KILLERS THREE.

SUNSET OF THE KILLERS THREE

He rode into a cattle town that morning, on a tall red roan,
following three ruthless killers, yet he had come alone.
All were looking at this stranger, as he stepped down to the street,
but no one spoke to him at all, for his gaze they could not meet.
He had a youthful look about him, later it was told
tanned and rugged features, with eyes so dark and cold.

He asked about three riders, of all the many folks around.
Silence was his answer, because they uttered not a sound.
He went on with a description of the three men he did seek,
the first being tall and thin with a long scar on his cheek,
another was short and fat, had beady eyes much like a rat.
The last, he said dressed in black, then left it there just like that.

The people turned their back and began to slowly drift away,
except for one brave young lad, who was curious enough to stay.
He must ask a question, of this man who came to his town.
Why did he come after three? Why would he chase them down?
He got an answer to his question far more quickly than he’d thought,
as the cowboy replied, “they must pay me for the pain they brought”.

They had ridden up to his ranch house and killed his child and wife,
but the bullet they had fired at him did not take his life.
It had knocked him out for hours, but only grazed his head.
When they’d taken what they wanted, they’d left him there for dead.
He’d been trailing them for months, now had caught up with them all,
and said he would not rest, until he saw the last one fall.

The lad told him where to find them, in a shack down by the river.
The cowboy smiled for the first time, a smile that caused a shiver.
He turned then and once again swung to the big roan’s back,
heading toward the river and the killers in that shack.
He left his horse by the water in the shade of a cottonwood tree,
as he crept up to a window, there to see the killers three.

By that time the whole town had arrived, a fools gunfight to see,
thinking the cowboy might beat one, but never two or three.
The stories told to young and old, how he was more than fair
and faster than a lightning flash, as he left three lying there.
I’ve written down this story exactly as it was told to me.
Now I pass on to you, how the sun set on the killers three.

36 lines.

©2017
Monty