Cowboy Poetry

In all of my years of public school English (and History) I never once heard of cowboy poetry. It wasn't until we did a Westward Movement unit study in our homeschool that then narrowed into a unit on cowboys (and horses) that I became aware that cowboys have their own genre of poetry all to themselves, which is worth taking a look at. 

At one of our many stops along the Oregon Trail I picked up this entertaining CD to help us pass the drive time:

It's a combination of cowboy banjo, fiddle, and yodel, with some tracks of poetry in between. "The Lady in the Church" by Jared Nesset and "Diaper Rodeo" by Bill Boycott are giggle poems to break the ice with kids who think they don't want to listen.

Charlie Daniels made a fantastic CD for kids that is really great to use with a Cowboy or Westward Movement unit study; not only is it toe-tapping good music but he also narrates some bits that teach history. Most of the songs would be classified as ballads by poetic standards and thus perfect in our current study of poetry. For our poetry studies, we specifically focused on the ballad of John Henry on this CD, and "Cowboy Logic" as part of the genre of cowboy poetry.

Cowboy poetry is like Shakespeare in that it is meant to be performed. Believe it or not, there are a lot of professional and hobbyist cowboy poets out there and several midwestern and western states have a lot of large gatherings for shows, sharing, and appreciation. 

One up and coming cowboy poet on the performing circuit is twelve-year-old Thatch Elmer, the Bear River Buckaroo from Wyoming. Click that link and you can listen to some of his stuff.

We also checked out a book of cowboy poetry, both for the genre and for some more ballads to add to our studies. I previewed it and flagged some specific poems for the kids to read (along with the introduction). 

The poems I felt suited our purpose best were "The Cowboy's Soliloquy" by Allen McCanless, "The Flyin' Outlaw" by Curley Fletcher, "The Cowboy's Prayer" by Curley Fletcher, "Tribute to Freckles and Tornado" by Jon Bowerman, and "Easy Chairs and Saddle Sores" by Ross Knox. 

I told the kids that after they read all of those they needed to choose one of them to read aloud to me since they're meant to be shared that way. Interestingly, "The Cowboy's Soliloquy" was the favorite for this activity. This old poem was first published in 1885, but was certainly recited long before that. It's thoughtful, figurative, and includes an interesting commentary on the similarities between cowboys and Biblical patriarchs.

I hope that more teachers will incorporate cowboy poetry into both their literary studies and their explorations of the culture of the American West. From descriptive ballads telling a range of stories to anecdotal, legendary, and downright funny verse, to pensive appreciation for life and work and nature, cowboy poetry isn't just for cowboys.