Cowboys I could have loved Cody or Hickok or Dillon or Doc. I would have loved the feel of trail dust falling from the brim of a worn hat to powder my naked breasts. I do love callused hands, muscle and bone of cold steel, silver flecked hair tousled wild by riding across the desert, skin bronzed crisp by wind blown sun. They were the kind of men a woman would just go bad for, die for, without thinking of dying; living only to feel those rough hands roaming her own hills and valleys. I would love to be kissed tenderly by warm soft lips, parting hungrily to take their fill atop moonlit mesas, and by hidden desert pools. When the same owl sounds and meadowlark songs echo through my window as the cowboy heard in lonely trail camps, I think he might have loved me with such fire. Sometimes, the hunger for it makes me feel lonesome clear to the pit of my belly. The years between us cannot be crossed, yet I know; I could have loved a cowboy.
Shirley Alexander © 2005
