Barbaro
Do you know why they put down racing horses with broken legs? They shoot them in the head with a hexagon bolt because a race horse will never stop running; even after a leg break. His whole life he will try to run and trot and every time he does he will break the leg or tear the tendon and be in pain forever. So the humane thing to do is put him down.
A sprinter walks up to the starting line and even with a limp he starts out as strong as he can. He is conditioned to take the first step just as hard as he always has. The next ten or so are in pain but still taken hard and with the idea of overcoming pain. Then the hand grab on the back of the leg happens. Then the face makes the look as if a hot poker had stung his back side. He goes down as if shot by a bullet. If you put him back in the blocks again, he would do the exact same thing. It's how he is conditioned. He runs. He grimaces. He clutches. He falls. He does it again even after the idea of racing should be gone from his head.
Some say love can change any mentality. You can fall in love and stop running through pain and killing yourself. You can be in love and not want to die. I can firmly tell you that you can be in love and still attempt to kill yourself every time you try to sprint out of the blocks. You run. You grimace. You clutch. You fall. Over and over again you do these things until one day someone or something puts you out of your misery and you no longer have to feel the pain of false starts and you don't have to look at hurdles that you never even got the chance to leap over.
The horse that suffered the leg break on Saturday would be lucky to just be put down. Every time he smells a mare near by or feels the need to stretch his legs he will try to sprint and run. One day, the leg he broke, will break again and we'll all wonder if the mending process is worth the trouble. Or by that time we won't even remember or care what the horse's name was anyway.
Bright sides come in from all cracks in the box you lay under. You can see the dayllight calling your name and you want to lift up one corner of the box to see what goes on in the light. But, when you do, the light comes in an blinds you. Your natural reaction is to flinch backwards and let down the box on the floor to not allow any more light in. Eventually, you'll try it again and again until the glare isn't so foreign and your reaction isn't to be scared but instead to be curious and seek health.
In the pines, the pines, the sun that shines, I'll shiver the whole night through.
