#lasca dramatica

*excerpts from Lasca by Frank Desprez*

I want free life and I want fresh air;

And I sigh for the canter after the cattle,

The crack of the whips like shots in a battle,

The medley of horns and hoofs and heads and wrangles.

The green beneath and the blue above,

And dash and danger, and life and love —

And Lasca!

Lasca used to ride

On a mouse-gray mustang.

Little she cared, save to be by my side,

To ride with me, and ever to ride,

From San Saba’s shore to LaVaca’s tide.

She was as bold as the billows that beat,

She was as wild as the breezes that blow;

From her little head to her little feet

She was swayed in her suppleness to and fro

By each gust of passion.

A sapling pine

That grows on the edge of a Kansas bluff

And wars with the wind when the weather’s rough

Is like this Lasca, this love of mine.

She would hunger that I might eat,

Would take the bitter and leave me the sweet;

But once, when I made her jealous for fun,

At something I’d whispered, or looked, or done.

She drew from her breast a dear little dagger,

And — sting of a wasp! — it made me stagger!

An inch to the left, or an inch to the right,