Dickinson State University - Prairie Smoke Yearbook (Dickinson, ND)

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Dedication DR. KENTON VICKERY

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PRAIRIE SMOKE DICKINSON STATE COLLEGE DICKINSON, NORTH DAKOTA

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 COUNTRY GRAVEYARD BLUES The evenin bell is ringin in the church, A line of cows comes mooin from the posture, A farm-hand, all tired out, goes walkin home. An leaves me standin here alone an thinkin. The twilight fades; the world soon disappears; And everything is quiet as the grave. Except ye hears a beetle circle by Or someplace ya kin hear a sheepbell ring. . . . They's lotsa big shots livin in th world— All high an mighty, thinks they's goin places. An turns their noses up at guys like these. But what the deuce? They got no room to grin. They brags about their grandads and their family, What they says goes, they brags; they wears swell clothes; Their dames is fashion-plates, an mighty grand; They'll get what these folks got, and nothing more. Swell tombstones and brass plates stuck up in church Don't do no good; ya won't be there ta hear The preacher lyin bout how good ya was. An you won't hear the organ an the choir. Ya can't bring people back from death ta life With fancy urns and lifelike statue heads; Funeral honors falls flat for the dead An soft-soap don't smooth nothin for a corpse. . . . His head lies here upon the ground As if it were upon his mother's lap; The world outside this town knew nothing of him, He had no education, none at all. And when we saw him he was always sad. But he was good to everyone, and kind; And he was honest; God rewarded him. He cried when he saw other people suffer. He was too poor to help in other ways; Yet God made everyone he knew his friend. That was good enough for him; his needs were small. Why should we give him any other praise. Nor shall we speak against him, though, of course He had his faults, just like the rest of us, For now he is at peace; he is with God. —By Dr. Kenton Vickery