Some of the year's most popular events take place in December, including the Larry Chittenden Cowboy Celebration in Anson, Texas; Michael Martin Murphey's Cowboy Christmas Ball at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museumin Oklahoma City; the 21st Annual Cowboy Christmas Poetry Gathering in Wickenburg, Arizona; and California's 11th Annual Monterey Cowboy Poetry & Music Festival.

Top cowgirl poet Doris Daley will be in Monterey (along with Don Edwards, Hot Club of Cowtown, Sons of the San Joaquin, the Gillette Brothers, Dennis Gaines, Pat Richardson, Jess Howard, Waddie Mitchell, Lacy J. Dalton and others; December 11-13, www.montereycowboy.org).

Doris Daley's recent poem offers a fine way to bid farewell to the year:

Goodnight to the Trail

Come with me to a place out west
Where all who trod are Nature's guest
We'll ride to the top of a piney crest
And gaze at the valley below.

Come with me where the cattle graze
We'll tighten our cinches and gather the strays
Leather's creaking, the hills are a-blaze
And the night might bring some snow.

Ride with me as the sky turns gold
Hear the cattle bawl and the magpie scold.
Pull up your collar 'cause the wind is cold,
Coffee'll taste good tonight.

I wish my pen could find the wings
To soar with rhyme when the nightwind sings
But words are often feeble things
To get that job done right.

But the rhymes won't come; my pen is dry
No poem could capture this sweep of sky
Let's hit the trail and say goodbye
To this patch of God's good clay.

So mount up, Joe, let's ride for home
The range wants to sleep 'neath its starry dome
The wind and sky can finish this poem,
We'll call it quits for today.

So ride with me as the light turns pale
See the moon come up, hear the coyotes wail
Supper's waiting, and we say to the trail,
Good night, Old Friend, good night.

 © 2009, Doris Daley, All rights reserved

Doris Daley returns to the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in January, 2010, her eighth invited appearance there. Her latest CD, Beneath a Western Sky, includes the poem above. It's available for $15 (US), $20 (CDN) plus postage from Doris Daley, Fiddle DD Enterprises, Box 103 Turner Valley, AB  TOL 2AO; http://www.dorisdaley.com/.

Find more about hundreds of cowboy poets and Western musicians at CowboyPoetry.com. It's an on-going gathering, with continuous news, features, poetry, lyrics, gathering reports, and an extensive event calendar. Come on by and stay a while.