My Hand Back example essay topic

From Salt Hill Manifest Destination A hot wind curls the leaves and chases the dogs digging deep into the dry soil. I live in the gut of the bright failure called America. I live in this hell named Nebraska. It's one hundred and seven today and grasshoppers from outer space are dancing in my brain. The air-conditioner is broke so I run a tub of cold water and submerge every half hour.

There's a wet trail from the bath to the couch and nearby fan. The air is heavy with grain dust. The "wheaties" are up from Oklahoma with their caravan of combines. I crave winter. I want a blizzard that blinds me to my fellow man. These are my dark times.

Every other day I grieve for the me that was and every man or woman I see fills me with contempt. Nine out of ten Skins in town are hang-around-the-fort welfare addicts. Every weekend their violence and drunken wretchedness fills the county jail, but I'm far beyond embarrassment because the white people are even worse. Varied branches of that inbred, toothless mountain trash in "Deliverance", settled here and now own the bank and most businesses. It's undeniably true that these white people in Cowturdville could be hillbillies except for the fact that these are The Plains.

Drive on, rednecks, to the edge of your flat world and fall down to a better hell. Every single thing about this town is sadly second-rate and I haven't been laid in more than two years and there's this fat lady with varicose veins who calls me late at night and begs me to come over to her trailer for a drink. Here, in this Panhandle town farm kids speed desperately up and down the main drag wearing baseball caps backwards and throwing gang signs they " ve seen on the tube and their parents, glad they " re old and tired, truly believe that those pictures we " re now getting from Mars have meaning. As far as I can tell, I'm one of the few people in Cowturdville who's gone to college and I often wish I never had, but Christ on a pogo stick... I think I'm starting to like it here in this American heartland. Thunderheads are forming and the sweet-ass rain of forgiveness is in the air.

Source: web from The Cortland Review Song of the Snake Several years slithered by and then an honor song played on KIL I-FM is how I find you passed on to the spirit world. First thought: the snake grew back. There are some of us the snake will not bite at all; we " re either lucky or cursed. Others will get bit, punch the snake in the eyeball, and toss it away forever. And others of us will get bit, yank the snake away and leave the teeth imbedded in our inflamed flanks. We " ll be fine for a while, then those fangs will begin to gestate; eventually the snake will grow back full-sized and spitting, guiding us to stand with shit-pants and wild, holy eyes, hands out, begging for a cure.

Tah ansi... that was you when last we met. source: web Adios Again, My Blessed Angel of Thunderheads and Urine Ah, so there you are, somewhere between the demerol and the morphine, silently emptying my catheter jug. Don't do that, I want to say, but my voice is lost from two weeks on the ventilator. Baby Girl, I want to say hello, say I know your name, say how much I've always loved you, but only a rasp comes and then you are gone forever again. I know I've got a crinkled picture of you boxed somewhere in my shuttered house. The image is as foreign as it is faded.

Somewhere west of Tulsa, you are leaning against a black Bug, smiling and pointing at a remarkable formation of thunderheads that tower and bluster miles past heaven. Your long, black hair dances below your waist. Your worn Navy bell bottoms are snug against your perfect legs, your strong, loving hips. After I snap the photo, you tell me that you " re going back to nursing school.

Me, I'll wander in the wilderness for thirty years before I see you again, and then, it will be only for a brief minute while you empty my urine bucket and I try to cough up words that will not come like the flashing pain beneath my sutures that signals healing and wonder. source: web from Hanks ville Note to a Young Rez Artist Hey, I thought they were eagles circling above, a good luck sign for Skins, but closer inspection revealed them to be the turkey vultures of broken English. Hey, I remember once you sent me a hand-scrawled note saying you were out of typewriter ribbons and I sent you off fifty bucks that same day and you wrote back saying you got the ribbons and some Big Macs to boot. Young brother, now I'm puzzled down to the core of my sour-wine soul, I'm mired in middle age and you " re becoming famous before your time and I'd envy you except that I, too, thought I knew what red pain was in my mad-groaned, goofball twenties. 1997 Adrian Louis.

Ceremonies of the Damned, University of Nevada Press. Online source: web from North Dakota Quarterly Getting a Second Opinion I've just bought you a new winter coat and we " re temporarily sane, cruising two blocks down the street from K-Mart in Rapid City. Three young Indian boys, fourteen, maybe fifteen years old and living the thug life are strolling across the busy street making cars stop and I slam on the brakes and give them the finger and they flash gang signs and one pulls a small, silver gun and I stomp on the gas and in the rearview mirror I see them laughing and I know positively by the fear in your eyes that not only is the white man's God dead, but the Great Spirit is too. source: web from New Letters Black is This Night of Love "I hope we make it home before this storm", I say. "I hope we make it home before this storm", you say. Me: "It's gonna be bad". You: "It's gonna be bad".

It's incredibly black, black beyond metaphor just before the blizzard hits. Late March, late night in the car near Bordeaux Creek, in the pines between Chadron and Rushville. The trunk of our new used LeSabre is pregnant with supplies, mostly TV dinners from Safeway since I do all the cooking now and the Blue Oyster Cult anthem "Don't Fear the Reaper" is rocking the oldies station. I reach over, pretend to muss your hair but really I'm holding down the dark balloon that is your head. You wiggle your skull from my hand.

"Sometimes you really get on my nerves", I say and reach for your hand thinking of the three times tonight you wandered off in the grocery store. "Sometimes you really get on my nerves", you say and squeeze my hand back. "I love you", I say. "I love you", you say. "Are you just mocking me" I ask I can't see your eyes, not that it would help. "Sometimes you get on my nerves", you say.

You let go of my bloodless hand. "What's wrong" I ask. "I don't know", you say. "Really, what's wrong" Again you say that you don't know. "Okay", I say, "Let's do the tables. How much is six times six" You: "Sixty-six."Five times five" You: "Ninety-five."That's wrong.

What's five times five"I don't know", you answer. "Shit", I yell, exasperated. Searing, sizzling sad, I crank up the Blue Oyster Cult and fill the void until the white swirling blizzard hits. Somewhere in the blinding snow I feel your hand on my shoulder.

"I love you", you say. "I doubt it", I say, a pitiful big man pouting in darkness. "I love you", you say, and I shudder and reach for your hand. It is warm and you are wak an. from New Letters, 64: 1,148.

Online source: web.