American Wild
Bio
Exploring the Great Outdoors
Stories (15/0)
First Black Quarterback of the NFL
1945 is remembered for the demise and Fall of Nazi Germany and the Japanese Empire, their surrender to the Allies, signifying the end of World War II. It is a year in American culture almost as important and honored as the year of her founding. September 10 was a Monday. A chicken that was decapitated on that day would become famous after going on to live another eighteen months without a head, and Marlin Briscoe, the first black quarterback of the Super Bowl era to start in the NFL, was born.
By American Wild2 years ago in Unbalanced
Briefly on the Mystery and Horrors of the Western Barn Owl
I looked an owl in the eyes two times in my life. They are a strange animal, more like a flashing ghoul rather than living, breathing creatures. In either experience, I could feel the essence of a great wisdom in nature bringing with it the stuff of death.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
Best Music 2021
Here’s some of our top artists this year. Let’s get into it. Valerie June: Valerie June is literally a star — a bright shining sphere of revolution— fallen to earth in the form of human dust in order to levitate our souls into higher consciousness with each song. A perfect manifestation of Southern Buddhism.
By American Wild2 years ago in Beat
Kill the Indian, Save the Man
Thomas Flowers died on an acre of land, a retired banker in Pecos, New Mexico and given a Christian wake delivered by a Priest at the New Desert Cemetery and was buried in make-up on his cheek, short and neatly combed hair, cotton shirt, tie and coat, khaki slackers and penny loafers. There were proverbs and psalms recited, his grandchildren sang hymns from the New Testament Gospel. There were no rattlers, whistling, drums of war, bullroarers, dancing or chanting. It was not a celebration of life, it was a Christian burial. The desert that day fumed with orange dust scattered from winds, lightning scorched the sky and touched down upon the earth, illuminating the symbol and spear of some ancient warrior god, and thunder roared with the thud of a thousand bulls like a cursed vision come in the span of a few seconds.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
Crown of Old Men
The boots belonged to my grandfather. They are not easy to wear. It takes both hands to pull one of the boots up by the straps and they ride almost all the way up the calf. There’re golden fireflies engraved on the soles and there’s dust that clutters down from there. There’s a bullet hole in the left heel and a faded blood stain. They’re colored brown and red as it were the sun and the dirt itself which manufactured them. They were made from the skins of Tennessee cattle and white-tail Georgia buck and bull shark. The leather over the years has been caked some and the lined cracks appear throughout the boots how cracks come into stone. They’re old but they still walk pretty good. There’s still the smell of thoroughbred war-horse in them. They were my grandfather’s and he gave them to me for my thirteenth birthday, about three years before they fit me just right, about three years before he passed away from earth.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
The Traveler and the Tavern
“Sit down and give ear to a story,” the innkeeper said, part Cherokee and part unknown, gray and combed hair, wearing a Victorian styled three-piece suit appearing as a gothic presidential candidate. The pipe in his mouth sparked, packed with a strange sea-weed colored tobacco and he exhaled roiling smoke and when it evaporated it revealed a great Buddha smile stitched upon his face.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
Leaves From the Field
At Christian Appalachian Southern Baptist Institute (CASBI) there are two statues in the garden with the water-spring pond and a brick walkway leading to the main campus. One of them is of Led Shear, holding a rolled-up playbook and appearing as though he’s going to smack somebody with it, his mouth and teeth and tongue roaring like a bear being hunted and shot. And the other statue nobody really cares about.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
Stone Table Paper Mill
It was built in the winter of 1939 right beside what would become the Leotie Military Cemetery, and appears at night as a house for the ghosts of the buried and it was built originally as a part of The New Deal to manufacture U.S. Army uniforms before being converted into a paper mill.
By American Wild2 years ago in Fiction
Day Has Gone By
The hospital is on a special land once belonging to the Cherokee. It is alongside the Tennessee River in Chattanooga. The Cherokee were removed from these very coordinates in 1838 and then the Union Army nearly starved to death in the same location in the winter of 1863.
By American Wild2 years ago in Confessions