99, part III, and: Bitter Earth, part II

39 Blas Manuel De Luna 99, part III Going down 99, 1 pass an old van, the field workers inside, packed, one against the other. I remember, as a child, riding, in the back of crowded vans, going to pick the fruits of this valley, hoping that one of the tires would flatten, stranding us for hours with nothing to do but sleep, hoping that, when we got to the vineyard, the grapes would be too bitter and the farmer would send us home, hoping that the migra would raid the field, the farmer cursing the officers, and the wetbacks who ran away, hoping that the sky would thunder and we would aU look up to an endless rain just beginning. Bitter Earth, part II Six years ago, I watched my father's compa, Lupe, get his foot ripped away by a tractor as he dumped his load of sweet nectarines into the bins. 40 the minnesota review blood exploded out of the stump, as if it wanted to flood the endless rows of trees, and he called out for a Mexican god. My father covered Lupe's eyes with one hand, and, with the other, searched through blood soaked nectarines for Lupe's mutilated foot. Blood ran down my father's arm as he held the severed foot above his head. Lupe thrashed and screamed while my father quietly prayed. As waves of heat rose from between the trees, as what wind there was quieted, then stopped, as the tractor's engine continued to cough black smoke into the air, as flies fed on the warm meat, Lupe bled to his death, a sacrifice to the fruitful earth. ...