Voices of a People's History of - Howard Zinn.epub by Howard Zinn & Anthony Arnove

Author:Howard Zinn & Anthony Arnove [Zinn, Howard & Arnove, Anthony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, politics, slavery, servitude, rebellion, revolutionary war, women's rights, indian removal, native americans, war on mexico, abolition, civil war, class warfare, labor strikes, gilded age, industrial revolution, manifest destiny, socialism, first world war, WWI, WWII, protest, Jazz Age, Mccarthyism, black surge, racial segregation, vietnam war, antiwar, LGBT, political prisoners, carter-reagan-bush, panama, gulf war, bill clinton, george w. bush, barack obama, war on terror, terrorism, whistleblower, independent media, occupy wall street
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
Published: 2014-12-23T00:00:00+00:00

John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath (1939)14

Ma went down on her hands and knees. She felt sand under her, and then the black inside of the mound no longer touched her, and she felt Tom's blanket on the ground. He arranged the vines in place again. It was lightless in the cave.

“Where are you, Ma?”

“Here. Right here. Talk soft, Tom.”

“Don't worry. I been livin' like a rabbit some time.”

She heard him unwrap his tin plate.

“Pork chops,” she said. “And fry potatoes.”

“God Awmighty, an' still warm.”

Ma could not see him at all in the blackness, but she could hear him chewing, tearing at the meat and swallowing.

“It's a pretty good hide-out,” he said.

Ma said uneasily, “Tom—Ruthie tol' about you.” She heard him gulp.

“Ruthie? What for?”

“Well, it wasn' her fault. Got in a fight, an' says her brother'll lick that other girl's brother. You know how they do. An' she tol' that her brother killed a man an' was hidin'.”

Tom was chuckling. “With me I was always gonna get Uncle John after ‘em, but he never would do it. That's jus' kid talk, Ma. That's awright.”

“No, it ain't,” Ma said. “Them kids'll tell it aroun' an' then the folks'll hear, an' they'll tell aroun', an' pretty soon, well, they liable to get men out to look, jus' in case. Tom, you got to go away.”

“That's what I said right along. I was always scared somebody'd see you put stuff in that culvert, an' then they'd watch.”

“I know. But I wanted you near. I was scared for you. I ain't seen you. Can't see you now. How's your face?”

“Gettin' well quick.”

“Come clost, Tom. Let me feel it. Come clost.” He crawled near. Her reaching hand found his head in the blackness and her fingers moved down to his nose, and then over his left cheek. “You got a bad scar, Tom. An' your nose is all crooked.”

“Maybe that's a good thing. Nobody wouldn't know me, maybe. If my prints wasn't on record, I'd be glad.” He went back to his eating.

“Hush,” she said. “Listen!”

“It's the wind, Ma. Jus' the wind.” The gust poured down the stream, and the trees rustled under its passing.

She crawled close to his voice. “I wanta touch ya again, Tom. It's like I'm blin', it's so dark. I wanta remember, even if it's on'y my fingers that remember. You got to go away, Tom.”

“Yeah! I knowed it from the start.”

“We made purty good,” she said. “I been squirrelin' money away. Hol' out your han', Tom. I got seven dollars here.”

“I ain't gonna take ya money,” he said. “I'll get ‘long all right.”

“Hol' out ya han', Tom. I ain't gonna sleep none if you got no money. Maybe you got to take a bus, or somepin. I want you should go a long ways off, three-four hunderd miles.”

“I ain't gonna take it.”

“Tom,” she said sternly. “You take this money. You hear me? You got no right to cause me pain.”

“You ain't playin' fair,” he said.

“I thought maybe you could go to a big city.

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