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From the Chute |
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I had stood through enough rodeos to feel a horse leave the gate wrong, but it made milk and hot beer crawl up my tongue to watch that bronco stomp the break farther and farther up its split leg. The rider had quit already, but the pastern was left a mess. Open as a prayer book and neither did it bleed. For a few seconds the weak part was alone, the cleaved red and a yellow bone brought out like from behind a curtain of flesh. To watch that animal, which, you couldn't find no dumber, to see it square to the task of its own destruction in front of women and children who had to be led away, it was a thought-about thing. Later they would suspect it started in the hoof but I think something was wrong in its mind, even dumb as it was, even if standing there stomping itself to death was just almost beyond its comprehension. |
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