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Alurista is recognized as one of the most significant Chicano poets. This Chapter 2 is excerpted from his first novel - La Novela. Alurista was born in 1947 in Mexico City and moved to San Diego, California, when he was thirteen. He holds a Ph.D. in Spanish literature from the University of California, San Diego. His poetry played a central role in the Chicano movement of the late 1960s and 1970s and continues to inspire new generations of artists and activists. Among Alurista's collections of poetry are Floricanto en Aztlan (1971), Spik in Glyph? (1981), Return: Poems Collected and New (1982), and Et Tu ... Raza? (1995). Alurista is available for recitals and lectures: (619) 423-7104. To read poetry by Alurista: |
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I first met her at the Igenio Azucarero de Zacatepec, the heart of the sugar cane monopoly in the great state of Morelos; Susana. Our eyes locked. I was leading a pack of ocelot from the Cristobal Colon, a military Catholic school in Cuernavaca. Her school, too, was on a field trip. The nuns guarded them like jewels off the Pope's crown. We managed to stumble into each other behind one of the thrashers where the paper-to-be refuse of the cut and cleaned sugar canes were machine-deposited after extracting all the sugar from them. Susana was also on scholarship at the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Catholic School for Girls. I knew the "School" well, it was across from ours. We were both in the fourth grade. The little jaguars were looking for me while Susanita y yo nos abrazabamos, nos besabamos. We kissed and hugged, kissed 'n' hugged 'n' hugged 'n' kissed. We belonged to the same class across the street where sexuality palpitated in each of us. Quique and Vic found us conversing, dialoguing, laughing, holding hands ... .everyone was lining up by the buses. The left hands on shoulder were going up.
-- You're tarde! The discipline sticks 'r' being readied.
-- Vamos or the palo de membrillo will slice our calves!
-- I'll get there in time jaguares! Let's go, Suzi!
... The motors of the old IH buses are warming up. I make it in, just before the gate slams shut.
-- We almost got fried, Xandro. My spinal column revertebrates, reverberates. I am in love.
The bus ride back to Cuernavaca snakes us back through rolling hills of maize fields receding to the onslaught of the sugar cane, cash crop in the world market. The people ate maize and chewed caña and used its strands to floss. Refined sugar had not scoured the jewels of their jaws. El Quique wants to be a dentist and Vic has all his dice in law school. Not one of the jaguars want to pursue a military career at the capital in El Colegio Militar de Mexico. We are feline, they are canine. The upperclassman riding with us that day stands in front of the aisle and commences his tirade of praises for the Mexican Army- at the time hunting for Rubén Jaramillo, a campesino from Cuauhtla who has taken up arms against the hacendados and the sugar mill company.
-- What is our school?!
-- Cristobal Colon! In chorus all dogs howl.
-- What is our tradition?!
-- Cristobal Colon! Catholic!
-- What is our honor?!
-- Cristobal Colon! Mexico!
-- What is our discipline?!
-- Cristobal Colon! Military!
-- What is our excellence?!
-- Cristobal Colon! The arts and sciences.
-- Crastibol Colon ... the jaguares mutter.
-- You know there is that bandido out there in our state roads. Rubén Jaramillo and his band of thugs are stopping the sugar cane trucks and burning them. Jaramillo is a terrorist. He has sequestered citizens from the capital. The fingers of these people have been cut off to take their rings. Ladies have lost emeralds and pearls off their necks, yanked by the paws of this misguided rabble who think Castro and Guevara a worthy example and sign of the times. Rubén Jaramillo must be informed that the Zapatista days are over. We have to inform him that Zapata is dead and history!! Jaramillo must and will be brought to justice. Military lieutenants trained in this our treasured Cristobal Colon, true men, who from here went on to the Colegio Militar de Mexico in Tenoxtitlan, are now amongst the principal strategists plotting to capture and execute Rubén once and for all.
-- This dude is waco, Xandro, like we got ourselves a rising little Adolfo here.
-- Yeah, just what we need, another Hitler, a Mexican Hitler.
-- Hey, let's throw a cuete out the window. Audy Murphy here will think we're being shot at!
- Hey cat, that can be daangerous ...
-- All the better, this ride is boring me.
-- Here they go!
-- Stop the bus! Cadets! Hit the floor Camilo, you come with me. Bring your forty- five. Where the hell is the Mausser? Open the door ... slowly ... .
There is a magnificent mockingbird symphony on the edge of the cornfield. Finches and cardinals criss-cross the road chirping snappy tunes. Eagles swoop and sway high above the low hills to the west. The sun races with them, seeking the coolness of the Guerrero state coast. Dopey Hitler and our bus driver Camilo go into the milpa. The cornfields are tall, and the stalks stand heavy with ears ready to pluck, ripe, crowned with the golden hairs of maturity and full flavor. We hear a couple of shots: no doubt into the air. Dopey returns to the bus. Camilo sits smoking by the road, squatting as only Mixtecas know how, holding his cigarette with both hands, as in prayer.
-- It's all right now, cadets ! You may rise to your feet. The vandals ran at the shot of my Mausser and the sight of our full regalia. Our uniform is feared, you know. We are the military school in Morelos.
-- Ah pu's que ! You are the military in Morelos, not us, Quique mumbles.
-- Pinchi liar! I'm telling you ... I bet he believes what he is barking.
-- Let's suggest an elote cookout before we get back and let's have a seance at dusk.
-- Sir, Lieutenant Pedroza, sir - clicking boots and saluting with garb - some of the cadets would like to suggest an elote cookout by the field, in order to let these vandals know that we from Cristobal Colon will hold ground against any guerrilleros.
-- Identify yourself when you address me, dog!
-- Underclassman Vic, at your command, sir!
-- Who knows how to handle detail for this operation, dog?!.
-- Xandro, sir! Underclassman Xandro.
-- You may leave, dog. Xandro!
-- At your command sir, Lieutenant Pedroza, sir!
- Do you know how to handle an elote cookout detail, dog?
-- Yes sir!
- What are you waiting for? On the double! You got two hours!
-- May I have two men, sir?!
- Choose your puppies, dog!
-- Vic, you get the wood, get two other perros to help you. Henry, you get the rocks. You'll need at least four perros. I'll clear the ground for the fire. Rest of you dogs come with me, half of you go into the milpa and gather fifty two ears, the biggest ones. The other half come with me. Let's clear a circle, get branches everyone! This is sweeping duty, compañeros. Who knows, we may even get to spend the night here. Quique, wait. I got to talk to you. Look ... I'll distract Camilo and Dopey while you get the tires deflated. Use the pencil, the eraser side. Just push it into the tire valves.
-- You're nuts, Xandro. They'll have our heads if we get caught!
-- They'll have yours if you don't synchronize with me. In ten minutes I'll call them to approve the fire site. By then your perros should be bringing down the rocks. Hang to the rear and do it! Or do I have to do everything? Do you want to distract them while I do it? What the heck are you going to talk to them about? I'm the one with the gab, remember?
I haven't done this for two moons. This is February's waning moon with Mars inside the lunar slice rising on the east. It is more fun at Compadre Cheno's ranchito. His field is up on the hills and often guarded by rattlesnakes which feed on the mice and even blackbirds that come looking for seed at planting time. By the time we had our first elote, the milpas towered above us and we had to pick the half-stalk ears.
First it is necessary to surround the milpa and walk in one direction making noise with wooden rattles and drums to shoo the snakes out the west side of the field. The best sling shooters tried their best aim at a snake head which was the only way to kill one and claim its rattle as a prize. This was a low field, and the mice stayed away from the trained ocelotes Tata Xieu kept as pets. The rattlesnakes took to the milpa alta, the high ground away from the stream and the people. They liked the rocks.
-- Lieutenant Pedroza, the site is clear and ready for approval, sir!
-- Very well, cadet! I'll draw the circle. Bring in the rocks, the wood.
-- We'll need Camilo to start the fire, sir.
-- Camilo! Get your Indian ass down here! Pero, ya! On the double!
sssssshhhhh. ssssssshhh. Two tires flat. Quique stealthily blends with the other rock- carrying perros. Vic is coming back with enough wood for two fogatas and then some. The corn plucking perros have been piling the ears of maize by the now well-drawn one-meter-in-diameter circle. Dopey Hitler barks out orders to set the rock circle, pile the wood and ready some dry husks of maize for firing. Camilo has gotten a spark going with his Ronson ... I do wonder where he got that silver-cased lighter. He says he won it in a game of cubilet dice. We now have to wait about an hour for the fire to settle into embers so that we can position the corn ears, husks and all, to roast on the cinders. Vic, Quique and I make our disappearing act to the west side of the field. Our seance is about to begin. The yellow-white sun is flaming orange-red. The fire crackles yellow-red with blue-white tips. The three of us assume the Mixteca squat with our palms hanging loosely on our knees. We can feel our own pulse that way and tune it with our breathing to dance with the gentle breeze that brings the frog song to the lowlands. I'm in love
-- Zapatavive, Vic whispers, enunciating clearly ... Zapatalives, Zapatavive, jaguares, Zapatavive.
-- 'n' we gonna' stay here all night, felinos, Quique duskdreams.
I try to visualize Nita on the face of the smirking February moon with Mars glowing on her forehead. Huizilopoxtli scintillates its red seeds as our irises expand, focusing on its light.
-- Camilo ! What is the meaning of this !? Here I come to get my poncho, and the tires are flat!!?
Camilo circles the bus three times and concludes.
-- The sun, the heat, the road, the wind is out of them. We will need to fill them up tomorrow morning, dawn: when the sugar cane trucks pass this road.
-- Que la chingada! Of all freaking times. The Senior Cadets Ball is tomorrow night. I have trillions of things to do? ¡Mierda!
-- We better get more wood, patroncito teniente ... the cadets ...
Camilo walks away smirking like the slivered moon and sparking light off his third red eye. His eyebrows arch like a hawk in full swoop to capture prey, walking toward the campfire.
-- ¿O'nta Xandro? I need to speak to him, joven perro, I sit here and wait.
Squat palms hanging five off his knees, taking his pulse, controlling his breath to dance with the dusk.
-- ¡Xandro! Camilo's looking for your face, and his looks are death incarnate. You better come now!
The sun had glowed out of our western gaze. Guerrero ocean waters would quench his thirst.
-- A'i voy! Brothers, the seance is over. For all our relatives, our feline mind, ¡Amen ¡Vamonos!
We raced back through the milpa high-stepping our knees to the height of our waist. It was easier and faster to go through the field the way Xieu had taught us. Vic and Henry ran up to the edge of the fogata and warmed their hands and behinds. I walked right up to Camilo. I had no choice except die.
-- Hear you looking for me, Milo.
-- El Dopey is fuming. You better pray to our Lord and Lady that the caña trucks don't get intercepted. Lieutenant Pedroza will fry me before he fries any of you.
-- You know the so-called "balazos" were not gunshots, Camilo. You know better. The trucks will show up at the break of dawn. This is Tata Xieu land, ¿Que no? Well, then ... as Napoleon said to his coachman: "Slow down, I'm in a hurry! "As Cantinflas would have it, Camilo "reeelax, reelax, relax. "The elotes are ready. ¿Quieres unos? Muchachos! ¡Al maize! Call little Hitler, Camilo, he's probably hungry.
-- You best pray, little jaguar. Best pray.
Adolfito walks into the camp, strutting like an angry peacock while turning his eyelids into snake squints. We offer him two of the best roasted ears. He barks.
-- ¡¿Hay agua?!, he howls. We got water?!
-- Hay ron, Camilo whispers to his chest.
-- Cadets! Chow time! Kill it! Get water from the stream. Camilo, leave me the rum.
We gather more wood and ears of corn We have to post guard for Tata Xieu's ocelotes; though domestic cat size they bear the hearts of ancient jaguars, pumas, and mountain lions. Ocelotes can be very mean if provoked. They normally do not bother with big game like humans. The are worse than pit dogs if you cross them. Camilo returns with lard cans filled with water. Tata Xieu keeps them by the stream for occasions like this one. This is a pilgrimage stop to Xochicalco, in Cuernavaca. Lieutenant Pedroza is getting bored ... and drunk. He's not allowed to fraternize with the underclassmen. I know what's coming.
-- Camilo! Organize a boxing match between the feistiest perritos here present. Now let's have a sixth grader and a puppy, a feisty; ... little dog. Camilo? Let's have us some fun. Here, have a swig ... ¡Indio de tu madre! Have a swig!
-- 'Ta bien, patroncito, as you say, it will be done. Gorila Ponce, take your shoes and your shirt off!
-- Right on! Give me a perrito to slaughter!
-- Now what? Nobody in the fifth grade has the huevos ! It'd be really pinchi to let a third grader take the pounding. Vic? Xandro? You know I can't do it. I wear glasses and can't see a thing without them.
-- Why don't you try to talk him into a boxing exhibit, Vic? He wins hands down. I'll take a few punches. Down on seven.
-- You're crazy, Xandro. You know this guy has wanted your blood since he joined the school in the middle of the year.
-- Negotiate it. ¡Xingao! Do it!
-- Hey gorila man. Xandro will take you on for an exhibition, "de a mentis" you know, like not-for-real match. He'll take some punches in the seventh round and give you a k.o. hands down. He'll give a good show, you'll look good.
-- I'm gonna cream him and put him in my coffee. I want to see him cringe and say "uncle."
-- Mierda, Xandro. Don't do it. Maybe one of the perros in our class will take him on.
-- This is an ocelot challenge. We can't afford to lose the respect of third, second and first. Let the fifth graders fry. It's up to us cats.
-- ... Get some water ready 'n' tell Camilo to save some rum for cuts.
-- This fight is yours. I don't want it, I mumble to his face as our hands are joined by Camilo.
-- There will be no hits below the waist or above the shoulders. A count of five is a knockout. No fall can last more than a five count. Only three falls allowed for a technical decision.
-- ¡Va por ti Susana! This one is for you, Suzi!, I mumble to myself.
-- Come over here, runt, let me quarter you in two chingazos!
I knew that Ponce's strategy would be to keep me away from his thorax with his skinny and wiry arms. He reminded me of my spider monkey. Ponce was eager to establish himself as a cadet before graduation, and I was his rite of passage. So be it. My only hope was to work under him right into his skinny gut.
-- Mocos! The dogs howl out. I am on the ground with a bleeding nose. Camilo rushes in and tries to stop the bout as I leap into Ponce's stomach doing a one, two, three to raise the dead, wake up the owls, and keep myself alive. The gorila falls windless. I am exhausted. My face hurts. I'm grinning and clenching my teeth.
-- Get up perro, and I'll have you roasted behind the Palacio de Cortes in Cuernavaca! Ponce says nothing and takes the count. Uno, dos, tres, cuatro. ¡Victoria!
¡Victoria! Perro Xandro wins! Knockout. Limpio. Clean Fight.
Lieutenant Pedroza has dozed off leaning against the truck's flat tire where he had a balcony view of our growing pains.
-- Get me some water, Vic, Quique. ¡Jaguares! ;Agua!
I fall to the ground on my knees and grab Ponce's hand in a solid two-handed shake. I rise and hit my heart with open right-handed paw and tell him
-- My heart is yours. Buenas noches.
Mierda! Just because I'm the smallest and on scholarship, all these spoiled pretty-boys want my blood. I lie by the fire now. Susanita's face is shaping out of the smoke. The frog song and cicada orchestra are into full swing. Bats and owls are flapping around. ¡Mierda! I'm in pain and I'm in love. I fall on my back clutching the piloncillo de panocha which Susana gave me in exchange for one of my poems. I clutch it tight to my chest, smirking, mirroring the slivered moon. Mars has moved out of its grin. The Ahuehuete branches sway.
-- Brown sugar for life ! Zapatalives ! Excellence: Cristobal Colon: Arts and Sciences ... so what?! I sink into the meandering of Nezahualcoyotl Acomixtli
Where is your heart?
If you give your heart to each and everything, you lead it nowhere: you destroy your heart. Can any truth be found on earth?
Our lady's skirted darkness gleams in a blue-black cape filled with the diamonds of a Morelos slivered moon. Venus rises to square off the trinity of light. Grandmother moon smirks back, Mars and Venus stand side to side. If you put your ear to the moist earth, you can hear the slithering water snakes. The ocelotes should be stalking just now. I hear a purrr-growl. They're here; Ome and Teo. The earth rumbles caress my tired bones. My navel has connected to a warm spot on the periphery of the fogata The night hawks swoop down and fly off with chicotera water snakes.
-- Iaa, Iaa. ¡Perros! ¡Camilo! They're killing me! Dopey shrieks in pain, agony, and fear.
We all rush to the scene. Ome and Teo have jumped him, not without provocation for sure. Little Hitler's thigh and buttock have been pawed into bleeding. He's lucky they didn't go for his throat, sinking their jaws into his aorta.
-- You should have seen the size of these mountain lions, twice my size each one!
-- Everyone back to your petates. I'll take care of Lieutenant Pedroza! It's a good thing you didn't drink all the rum, patroncito, your're gonna need it now. Xandro! Bring some water over here! We got to clean his wounds and dress him. Get some ashes and a sheath of that aloe vera plant.
Dopey moaned and groaned for a while until he got drunk again and passed out babbling inanities and self-deprecations for his bad star. He'll never make it to the Cadet's Ball now, at least not in one piece. Morpheus calls. I fell asleep stalking the smile of dawn.
