Dia De Los Muertos, Vera Cruz y Punta Cancun
Dia De Los Muertos, Vera Cruz y Punta Cancun, 2004
He chose a table in the sun, to the surprise of the hostess, picked mangos and pineapples from the pancake breakfast buffet, ordered double espresso in the native tongue and sat down to write. Earlier, he had inscribed the names of those whom had passed before him on the back of a coaster and placed it in a bowl of sand, next to a wrapped chocolate coin with the head of a Mayan king embossed in gold foil, three one peso coins, a clear glass of water, and a feather, that fell from the head of a dancer during a Dia de Los Muertos ceremony the night before. He often recited the family names of various ancestors, but it had been years since he inscribed or said aloud the first names of the departed sisters of his mother, or recalled fondly an uncle that he had unintentionally forgotten. Upon return to the states, he would decorate his father’s grave with flowers and river rocks, then begin a piece of art whose components had been following him around for years: Skull inscribed in wood, clay and paper mache, surrounded by dried flowers mounted in twisted vines; the cross that his father occasionally admired, adorned with feathers found, purloined or caught falling from the sky; stones, shells, sand, dried leaves and seeds all stuffed into drawers or wrapped in paper and gently placed into boxes and bottles; thorns carefully removed from sticks, and sticks bound together for unknown future use. Storing, arranging, and re-arranging—native liturgical art, passed from father to son, illuminated by a lunar eclipse in a Mexican sky. His father’s meditative crafting of variations on the crucifixion suddenly a clear expression of the divine attraction to thugs and thieves, the afterlife simply another undistinguished day in undiscovered paradise.
Who is it that feeds the hungry, ministers to the sick, the addicted, recycles the discarded, and weeps rivers over dead fish and smoky skies? Who is it that reaches out every day, tips more than standard, and makes eye contact with the janitor, the cashier, the floor sweeper, the maid? Who says, “Let me show you”, instead of, “Let me do that”? Who says, “Thank you”, instead of, “That’s not what I need”? Who knows that in the land of scarce resources, patience is currency and the dead have no king? Democracy is concrete and rebar. Fuel is currency, and redemption, redemption is clean holy water: safe to drink, available indoors and hot in the morning! Privilege without responsibility paves the road to terrorism. Development simply to increase profits is a weapon of mass destruction. Credit creates layers of poverty as strong as staggered bricks. Tell-us-our-Vision is a concrete column, providing structure, resistance to time and vertical integration across intentional and accidental holes in the system. We are not all rich in Los Estados Unidos, we are simply content to enjoy wealth when we can: new shoes, fake jewels, strap-on technology and a personal pan pizza in every port of call! Still, the local people think Rap TV is real; that everyone on every street sports bling, lives in a Hollywood home; that all blancos eat in the same places as the Los Angeles stars, that everyone has a BanaMex card and gets a new car every three years! Like their elders and their ancestors, the children of Vera Cruz do not beg; they sing, offer flowers, sell single cigarettes, and cups of salted seeds. There is pride in work, in contributing to the moment. His father understood this; understood that at every crossroads, every bend in the river, every change in the wind, there is a moment to be savored. If you understand that there is no “away”, that you can only throw things into holes dug in the earth, then you begin to save everything and over time, re-use, re-arrange and re-create until there is no more room, at which time, you have all that you need, and must, of necessity, come to know your neighbors.
Jeffrey Michael Bowen. "Dia De Los Muertos, Vera Cruz y Punta Cancun" Facebook Notes. 2016
Originally written and archived by Jeffrey Bowen circa 2004.