Pushcart 2026 L: Yxta Maya Murray, “Lords of the Wind” from Conjunctions #82

Photo by Sam Chase, U.S. Geological Survey: “a huge dust plume rising like a gigantic mile-high wave over the southern San Joaquin Valley in December 1977.” You want me to tell you about the day of the dust? I see, you’re a writer. Doing a story. And here I was, thinking you came to see me about your hands. Hands, honey. Didn’t you see the sign on my door? That’s the business I’m in. The hand business. No, I can’t conjure those ghosts with you this morning. Got a day of patients ahead of me. Oh, Marisol said I’d tell you all about the typhoon, huh? That woman is a bug in my bourbon. She collar you at the Fiesta Market? You must have wandered into the cheese aisle and bumped into her mouth. Yeah, I remember it. The Great Dust Storm of 1977. Wiped out Lamont, Arvin, Bakersfield. Sand made the sun bleed. Buried houses, cars, orchards, cattle. People. The living and the dead. I’m a scientist, so I don’t go in for superstition. Still, with everything we’d gone through, it was hard for some…