song of the burning woman by ire’ne lara silva
Emma Elisa
I said I’d grow the flowers myself.
And I did. From seed. Now here they were, blooming everywhere, in every shade from lemon- yellow to gold to orange to dusky red. Solid and striped. Some the sizes of bushes. Others fit wholly in my hand with the roots lying on my wrist. Every variation I’d been able to find – African, French, Signet, Tangerine Scented, Spanish Tarragon, Irish Lace.
The idea came to me last year when I was taking down my Day of the Dead altar. I hadn’t built such an elaborate one in decades. But the silence and the isolation had seemed to call for it. No one had thought we’d still be social distancing last November. I don’t count the months anymore. I only remember it was a March when the world moved from one kind of time to another, one kind of space to another, one understanding of death to another.
And the days and the months and the years were like an accordion, flexing this way and that, speeding up and then slowing down. People got sick. People got better. People died. It was a weird thing at first, to be a woman without family in a pandemic. I never knew my father. My mother died when I was in my twenties. No brothers, no sisters, no close cousins. No connections to elderly aunts or uncles. All those connections long gone. Left behind when I decided that neither hiding nor judgment were for me. I didn’t know if they lived or died. Even before the pandemic, I’d sometimes search online for their names and add the word “obituary.” As the years passed, there were fewer names to search.
I made my arrangements years ago. Before I retired. Went to the funeral home and laid everything out, paid for everything. My friend José said he’ll deal with my art and Sol will take care of everything else. I’ll leave no chaos behind me. Maybe my friends will gather, wish me well in the afterlife, pour a little tequila on the ground for me.
I’ve always loved parties. Loved the music and the colors and the people and their joy and the dancing and the food and the drinks. Loved the planning and the inviting and the way time ran swiftly at the start and then slowed syrup slow in the later hours. Loved those molten hours before dawn when only close friends remained and the brightness of the night glowed like an ember in my chest. I always loved my own parties best – because hosting kept me busy when melancholy threatened. Because if I needed to escape, I forgave myself the need to make excuses.
I used to love dancing. When I was young, I could dance for hours.– flinging myself from one partner to another or dancing by myself or as part of a vast faceless crowd. I never cared if someone was watching – hell, sometimes I wanted everyone to watch. It never mattered to me as long as the beat compelled my body. When I grew older and one injury after another froze up my joints, the singing became everything. I’d sing until my voice turned to gravel, until it seemed my voice could fill the entire room, until everyone was singing with me, until I’d emptied out all the lyrics that lived in me. It didn’t matter to me if I could sing or not, or if other people were off key, what mattered was that we sang together.
My house is a little house. Nothing special to anyone but me. Corner lot. Eight- foot wooden fence for the backyard that I put in for my ex because she used to lay out naked whenever the sun was shining. Like a pinche legartija trying to get her cold- blooded heart pumping again. She left me three years ago. No fights. No arguments. She was just done with me. I finally got all her stuff out of the shed behind the house. I took anything someone could still use to the battered women’s shelter. Tossed the rest of it. I didn’t burn it like my dramatic heart wanted, but at least it’s gone now. Next time she thinks to call or text me and promises to come pick it all up, I’ll tell her, Nah, don’t worry about it. It’s gone. And she won’t believe it. I know what she’ll say. That I’m trying to make her hop on a plane and come see me. That I still want her back. She’ll say it’s because I never stopped loving her. That she knows she broke my heart and that I’ll never be able to love anyone else again. But that’s a lie. Only I know my capacity to love – and there’s enough left for someone else. Enough love left for one more great love. Or maybe three little ones. Even though my hair’s grey. Even though I’ve been retired for ten years. Even though my body is wrinkled and sagging and plump and scarred. But none of those things diminish me. I am more now than I have ever been.
It felt a bit odd to plan for a party again. I was cautious beyond cautious, waiting through pandemic waves. Years without drawing up lists and planning out the space and thinking of what I needed to build and who to invite. But even my cautious heart didn’t want to wait anymore – it was time for a party. A small and lovely and long party. With talk and food and singing and dancing and art and photos. I asked Nora to make us tacos and Sol brought pan dulce and a huge pot of caldo. José volunteered to make drinks. I stocked up on chorizo, bacon, eggs, potatoes, and flour tortillas for whoever’s still here at breakfast time. I cleaned and cleaned until not a speck of dust remained. I set up stations in the backyard – six large ones, seven small ones. Built them myself. They’re not fancy – plywood and twoby- fours, hammered together with nails and prayers. And then I invited my friends to make altars of them.
I grew all the marigolds in anticipation of today. Marigolds along the fences and the house. Marigolds around the trees. Marigolds along the sidewalks. And marigolds bursting from My Lady. My Marigold Lady. Lady Cempasuchil. What else can I call her? She’s a little bit of one thing, a little bit of another. Multi- hued marigolds bursting from her earthen flesh. A little Xochiquetzal, the goddess of flowers and art. A little bit of me. Somehow, she has my mother’s eyes. I built her thirteen feet tall. You can feel her serene gaze from every corner of the backyard.
Pati
Ay, mira, it’s been 29 years and she still builds an altar for me. That same photo in a silver frame. Que bonito. And my favorite peonies, without stems, on the lace tablecloth. The first time I held a peony in my hands I told Emma Elisa they reminded me of the plump bodies of.doves. Soft, round, feathered. And look, a plateful of tamales. Chicken with salsa verde, each tamal tied with a little strip of corn husk. Like an extra blessing. Like little gifts. They’re even still steaming. And a little shot glass with tequila. And a cup of my favorite coffee, that fancy coffee she would special- order for me that tasted like coconut.
I see the Big Flower Lady in the middle of the backyard. There’s nowhere you can be that she can’t see you. I like the cempasuchil but mostly I just see chichis and nalgas and flowers coming out of her whatchucallit – Emma Elisa says yooohhhnis. I used to ask her all the time why she made so many naked lady statues with breasts and yooohhhnis and she would say, Ama, it’s about a woman’s eye seeing a woman. It’s about the desires of women. Los deseos de mujeres. And I would say, Okay, but make me something else. I don’t need woman parts on necklaces or earrings or keychains, m’ija. How about flowers? Or the sun and the moon?
My poor Emma Elisa, all alone. Some years she has someone, but most years, she’s alone. I wish I’d been able to give her some sisters and brothers. But she was my only. I didn’t tell the doctors they could cut me, but they did. I was only nineteen. Went to the hospital alone. No insurance. The doctors said I was signing for painkillers. My mother said it was probably for the best, because I fell in love and I fell in love and I fell in love and none of them ever stayed. She said those lying doctors were a blessing in disguise, or I would have had twenty kids with twenty different fathers. She’d already raised me and my sisters. She said she didn’t want to raise her grandchildren too. She never understood me – I just wanted somewhere to belong. I wanted someone to hold me and make me real. I wanted to make a home, a warm pretty place that didn’t smell like bleach and fried potatoes. I wanted a man to put his arms around my shoulders, to put his hand on the small of my back, to keep me warm and weigh me down and fill me and exhaust me. I wanted a home filled with laughter and kisses and affectionate touches. The men came and went, came and went, but mostly it was just me and Emma Elisa.
So I filled our home with flowers and leafing things. Bought us a color TV and soft furniture that I never covered in plastic. Emma Elisa like to draw and make things so I bought her a few things every week – crayons, watercolors, construction paper, Play- Doh. I worked part- time as a cashier at a grocery store and picked up shifts at the Mexican restaurant a few blocks away. I tried not to leave Emma Elisa with my mother too often. She always came back too quiet and sometimes with tear tracks on her face. My best friend Mari had four kids and was a housewife, so mostly Emma Elisa ended up over there. When she got older, she helped care for the little ones, drawing them pictures and keeping them out of trouble. She was always independent. By the time she was twelve, she’d cook herself dinner and do her homework without my having to tell her anything.
When she was sixteen she told me she liked girls, not boys. I’d just woken up and was still wiping the sleep out of my eyes. She said it low, a little nervous, with a look in her eyes like she thought I might hit her or like she might cry. I’d never struck her or even spanked her because I never wanted to be like my mother. I pulled the blanket back and held my arms out to her. She made a little cry and I held her the way I’d held her when she was a little girl and afraid to sleep when there was thunder. I kissed her temple. It’s okay, m’ija, it’s okay. You can love whoever you want to love. And she cried, just a few tears, because my Emma Elisa was always strong like that. It took me a few minutes though before I thought to tell her that it would probably be best not to say anything to her grandmother.
I was dating Ruben then. I thought he was going to be the one. He stuck around for a while, but then he left too. And then there was Frankie. And Joel. Emma Elisa went to the community college for a couple years and then moved to Austin to go to UT. David used to take me up there to go see her every other month. Take us out to a nice dinner and to go see some of his buddies playing live music here and.there. Before Emma Elisa graduated, she introduced me to her girlfriend Luisa and said she was following her back to San Francisco.. By then, David was gone and I was seeing Michael. We flew out once to see Emma Elisa in California, and once she took the Greyhound to come spend a few weeks with me here.
And then I met Elias, and he really was the one. He got down on his knee to propose, and I wore his ring. We set a date and picked a cake and sent out invitations and even Mama liked him. But then that day came. We were going out for lunch, to that little taqueria we both liked so much on North 10th street with the tacos de trompo and the baked potatoes and the good lemonade. He was kissing my hand and I was looking at him and neither of us saw the truck that ran the red light.
We never got to promise each other till death do us part. But it was okay, because we’d already promised each other forever, forever and that’s what it’s been. Two years together in life, twenty- nine together in the afterlife. He’s visiting his brother’s family right now, but he’ll be here before long. And he’ll take my hand and bring it up to his lips to kiss it and he’ll say my name and smile.
José
It’s an art. I told Emma we weren’t going to have that margarita mix shit from HEB. I brought all of my own bottles and ingredients. Enough Patron Silver to float us all away. My own syrups and fruit blends and garnishes. I had twenty- six specialties. One for every year Ismael and I were together. I didn’t know it was going to become a tradition – that first year I invented El Mango Tango Wango Margarita and served it to him with chorizo and papa taquitos in bed while singing “No Tengo Dinero” at the top of my lungs. That went over so well the next year he got El Tierno Corazon de Melon Margarita with green salsa chilaquiles and “Amor Eterno.”
The last time we celebrated an anniversary, he could barely eat or drink, but he sipped my Tulipan TinTan Te Quiero Mucho Margarita while I serenaded him with “Yo No Vivo Por Vivir.” At the time, I didn’t know how little time was left. The oncologist had estimated a few more months, but it was only a few weeks.
This is my first Dia de los Muertos without him. Elisa told me I could have one of the big altares, so I could do one of the big mixed media art and music installations I was known for. But that was “my work,” and I didn’t want to make anything that would be photographed and catalogued and written about. I didn’t want to answer questions in the future about how important Ismael had been to me or what reaction grief transmuted into art should evoke in the viewer. I just wanted to remember Ismael. So I told her the kitchen counter would be all the altar I’d need.
Elisa had a ton of marigold bouquets and tall white candles all over the kitchen. I’d printed up a pretty little menu with all the drinks..And though they weren’t expecting it, everybody got a little bit of a song with their drink: No Te Aguites Aguacate Margarita was served up with lyrics from “El Noa Noa,” the Cucurrucucu Coconut Margarita with “Querida,” and La Fresa Triste y Linda Margarita with “La Diferencia.” That last one almost made me break into tears, but then again, rancheras are supposed to make you do that. So if my voice wobbled, it wasn’t more than anyone expected.
I lost track of how many drinks I made, how many times the blender whirred, how many oranges, pineapples, strawberries, limes, mangos, and avocados moved through my hands. I spent my breaks eating the tiny little tacos Nora was making in the backyard with fajitas, cebolla asada, cilantro, and lime. I’d have a Corona and then go tour the altars as they were being built. I restrained myself mightily as I saw people struggling with color coordination and their arrangements. I reminded myself that love has its own aesthetic, that they would all look beautiful by the time they were done. If nothing else, we could always add more marigolds.
When Elisa wasn’t looking in my direction, I’d grab a quick marigold bloom and eat it. When we first saw Monsoon Wedding years ago, it awoke a ferocious hunger in me for marigolds. I won’t eat the ones from florists because I know they’re full of chemicals, but I could never resist them when I saw the edible flower petals at the grocery store. Or when I saw them in people’s yards. They taste a little smoky, a little spicy, a little bit like a single paint- stroke of sunlight on the tongue.
There was a quiet hour, just as the sun was going down, when everyone was busy finishing the last details of their altares, laying down flowers and food and photos. And candles were being lit everywhere – twelve- day candles in multicolored glass, patron saints everywhere, the Virgen de Guadalupe and the Virgen de San Juan vastly outnumbering everything else. Elisa was everywhere, handing out little ceramic plates and saucers in an effort to cut down the risks of everything exploding and catching fire and burning her house down to the ground. I don’t know what it was, but an impulse seized me and I took advantage of Mayra’s arrival to uproot an entire bush of pretty striped marigolds that were growing in the backyard. Elisa never saw me since she was busy directing the lighting of the twofoot- tall beeswax candles Mayra had brought all around the Lady.
I plucked a pile of the deep green leaves and then pulled the petals free by the handful. I rinsed them and put them into two glass bowls with ice water. Under my breath I started singing and it took me a few lines to realize it was the chorus from Juanga’s “Siempre en mi Mente.” Orange and grapefruit and lemon and lime and generous handfuls of marigold petals and this and that went into the blender. I was this close to pouring in some of the tequila when I suddenly thought of the three bottles of mezcal I’d brought to drink with Elisa and Kimberly. We always had mezcal when we were together, a tradition dating back to when we’d all been young artists in San Francisco. I’d brought three bottles of Del Maguey Vida Mezcal. I’d planned for us to drink one by morning and to gift them the other two, but I couldn’t resist. Its smokiness would complement the marigolds like nothing else.
How to explain what happened with that first sip? The feeling I felt.– like there was a small candle burning bright in my chest and its glow was growing and growing. I sang louder and louder and I didn’t even know I knew all the words to the song. I thought of how much Ismael would have loved this gathering, how he would have taken up a spot close to the Lady and strummed his guitar, breaking into song throughout the whole night. How he would have come to the kitchen to see what I was making and then laugh when I’d catch him stealing my fruit garnishes. How he would have wrapped his arms around my waist and leaned in close to press a kiss behind my left ear. And I thought for a moment I could see his reflection in the kitchen window and feel his beard stubble on my neck. And I thought perhaps he hadn’t really left me all alone. I salted the glasses and poured in the golden mixture and sipped it and for a moment tasted his lips again. And I sighed and named it.– the Cempasuchil Siempre Margarita.
Nora
I brought Miguelito’s favorite toys. His stuffed elephant that I’d named Don Policarpio and that he’d called Don Pio. A dozen little green army men, a jumble of Legos, his soccer ball. All the toys he hadn’t been able to take with him when his grandfather took him.
I brought all the snacks he’d loved when he was little – a bag of Doritos, chocolate M&M’s, the Mexican cookies with the pink and white puff marshmallows and coconut. Orange Fanta. I wasn’t there to see what he kept on loving, what he outgrew, what new things became his favorite things. Every gift I ever gave him afterwards was a guess.
I had other things of his to add to the altar. His favorite jacket. His watch. The photo of a pretty dark- skinned girl that had been under his pillow. When everyone was at the funeral, I broke into the house and took these things. They were mine to take. Everything was mine – the scent of his pillow, the imprint of his feet in his shoes, the thick dark strands of hair in the comb on his nightstand. And I took the framed photo my mother had of him in the living room.
I noticed every trace of me had been erased. Even after all this time I could see the darker places on the wood paneling where I remembered old family photos had hung. The photo of me and my two sisters on my tenth birthday. The photo of all of us that we’d taken at a special photography studio in Reynosa. My high school graduation photo. The photo of me in a high school football uniform. The photo of me at prom with Rosemary. All gone.
Back then, Rosemary had loved me as I was. It never mattered to her. I wore her clothes sometimes. She did my makeup and my hair. We did each other’s pedicures and manicures. We’d kiss and taste Magenta Kiss/ Red #578 on each other’s mouths. We moved in together after high school and Miguelito came along before either of us turned twenty. My father wanted me to work with him, said I’d make more money in his shop than working as a waiter at Red Lobster. That one day I could take over the business. But I wasn’t stupid enough to spend any more time than I had to around him. If it hadn’t been for Rosemary, I wouldn’t have survived my teen years at home. In his eyes, the only manly thing I’d ever done was make his first grandson.
I worked all the time those first years. So I don’t know when it started. Better said, I don’t know when it started to get worse. Rosemary had always liked to party. She’d keep on drinking as long as there was something to drink. Would smoke or swallow or sniff anything anyone gave her. She cut down a lot when we moved in together. I think it was because we were both free of our families for the first time. And then she got pregnant. We were so happy. She worked a part- time job and spent that money on a crib and toys. When Miguelito was born, she stayed at home with him. Maybe that’s when it started. But it wasn’t until he was three that I’d come home after a double shift and find Miguelito eating a pile of Lucky Charms on the.floor and Rosemary passed out on the couch. Beer bottles everywhere and the stench of pot in the air.
I started seeing some of our old friends from high school coming back around again. And all the signs were there. She was doing coke again. Taking whatever anyone gave her. We started fighting all the time.
At the same time, my mom kept calling and asking me to come by with Miguelito. Said it wasn’t enough to see their only grandson on holidays and their birthdays. But it was just so hard every time we went there. Everyone at work and in our neighborhood knew me as Nora. Miguelito called Rosemary, “Mommy,” and me, “Mama.” He was too little to understand that everything had to be different at my parents’ house. And it wasn’t like I could just wash my face and strip the nail polish off.– I had to drill all these reminders into my head for days before every visit.– how to walk, how to talk, what to say, what not to say, how to say it, how not to say it, to mirror my father’s mannerisms, to take up space, to not show too much affection, to not take my plates to the sink, to say that Rosemary wasn’t feeling well, to say that no, my mom and my sisters didn’t need to come check on her or cook for me or watch Miguelito, that the drive from Los Fresnos was too far. And every time I left their house, I’d drive to the grocery store parking lot close to Business 83 and just bury my face in my arms and cry and cry with relief to have made it through. And Miguelito would cry with me.
My friend Ani stopped waitressing when she had her baby. She started watching Miguelito for me.
Rosemary and I kept fighting. And then she ended up in jail after she got pulled over when she was high. I got home one day after I picked up Miguelito, and all her stuff was gone. Things went to hell quickly after that. My parents heard from Rosemary’s parents that she’d left. They came looking for me at work. Instead of Miguel Jr., they found Nora. They reported me to CPS for child abuse. They sued for custody. The judge called me a deviant in court.
I couldn’t find an attorney who would take my case. I tried filing the paperwork on my own, but the judge had me declared a vexatious litigant after denying me custody and then visitation. My father threatened to shoot me if he saw me. My parents adopted Miguelito and had my name taken off his birth certificate.
No Miguelito. No Rosemary. No family.
I still tried to make a life, to be true to myself. I was Nora and never had to pretend to be Miguel Jr. again. I left Red Lobster and opened up a taco truck. After a while, added a few tables, then a jukebox, cement to make a dance floor, a ceiling to shield people from the sun and the rain. Got a liquor license and sold beer.
I fell in love a few times. I had friends.
None of them knew I was also a ghost. That I watched my son from afar. Watched him go to school and run around outside during recess. Wondered if he cried for me before he fell asleep. Watched him as he grew taller and taller. Wondered if he remembered me at all.
And the years passed, and I had a little hope. That maybe when he was 18 and living on his own, I would walk up to his door and hold him again.
But I never did. An aneurysm took him when he was in high school. Even when he was dead, they wouldn’t let me hold him.
Mike
Death’s messed up. It’s all these little flashes of lights. And memories. ’Buelo said he’d shoot him if he came around. But I just wanted to know him. Well, her, I guess. My dad. My mom. Whatever. They told me he was crazy and he’d hurt me if I went with him. It messed with my head. I saw him . . . her . . . everywhere I went. Sometimes during recess when I was a kid, she’d be parked in a car on the street next to the playground. When we’d go to the pulga or the HEB, she’d be following us, staying out of ’Buela’s sight. I’d see her at church, six pews away, black lace over her face. But I always knew it was her. I didn’t know if she wanted to steal me away or what. And even though my ’Buelo said his son was a pervert and a sin against God, I didn’t get mad when I saw her. She made me sad. I thought about all my friends who didn’t have their fathers no more, and I thought at least mine wanted me.
She’d leave little gifts for me in the mailbox on Saturdays. Small things nobody would notice. A little Hot Wheels car, a sack of marbles, some M&M’s. When I got older, she’d leave a rolled up fivedollar bill, then tens, then twenties.
’Buelo and ’Buela were strict when I was little. I went to school, came home, did chores, did homework. Weekends went to more chores and church and big meals with all my uncles and aunts and cousins. The older I got, the more I looked like ’Buelo, and as long as I did what my ’Buelo wanted, I got to do what I wanted and go where I wanted. I got a driver’s license and my ’Buelo’s barely used Ford F-150 as soon as I turned 15. When ’Buela said I should be getting home before midnight, ’Buelo told her it was “cosas de hombre” and she needed to let me become a man, so I wouldn’t turn out like the desgraciado her son was.
None of my friends had chores to do. And there were always parties to go to. Somebody’s parents would be gone. There was an empty lot behind the abandoned gas station where we’d drink and hang out.with our girls. I got into a few fights sometimes, but nothing worse than a black eye or a few bruises. ’Buelo would only laugh and clap me on the shoulder the few times I came home a little drunk or a little bruised. He’d say, See, he can handle his liquor and drive himself home fine, or, See, this one don’t get beat down!
I don’t remember what my mom looked like. Or what her voice sounded like. Or how she smelled. But I remember crying and crying for my Mama. And how confused ’Buelo and ’Buela were because they kept telling me she’d left a long time ago. They threw away every photo that had either of my parents in it. Their names weren’t even on the birth certificate ’Buela kept in a zipped-up bank bag with her important papers. My mom never came to look for me, never called, never wrote, but I saw my Mama everywhere.
I didn’t make the best grades in high school, and I wasn’t on the football team or anything, but I had lots of friends and I never went more than a couple of days without a girlfriend after I turned 12. Lost my virginity when I was 13. I never got anyone pregnant cuz I was careful. I’d heard too many times how my idiot father had gotten my whore of a mother pregnant and that if I hadn’t looked so much like him, my ’Buelo would have wondered if I was even his grandson.
I liked having girlfriends. I like messing around with them, but none of them ever really made me feel anything. If one of ’em broke up with me, there was always another one waiting. And if I saw a girl I liked more than the one I had, then I’d break up with one and go around with the other.
Until I met Araceli. ’Buelo didn’t like her. He said she was too dark. That I was a good- looking kid and I could marry White or at least one of those rubias, all blonde and blue- eyed even though their last names were Garcia or Gonzalez or Reyna. But I thought she was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. She had the most beautiful eyes, a little slanted and a hot gold color. Her skin was dark and beautiful, so clear and smooth. She was so funny and a little bit of a smartass in class. She was always having to stay late for detention for talking back to the teachers, so I’d wait for her in the parking lot until they let her out. What I loved most about her, though, was that she was so cariñosa. None of my girlfriends had ever touched me like that. Most of them would put their hands on me like they wanted to show that they owned me. Or they’d wrap my arm around their shoulders or their waists like they wanted all my attention all the time. But Araceli would touch me softly, her hand on my arm or my shoulder, for just a moment. If I pulled her even slightly towards me, she’d cuddle into my side or sit on my lap. Without any shyness, she’d press little kisses next to my eyes, on my jaw, sometimes even on my hands. She’d run her fingers through my hair or drum the beat of whatever song was playing in her head on my chest.
The first time we were together, everything was so slow. There was no rush but no hesitation. The afternoon light was streaming in through the window. I kissed her eyes. I cupped her small breasts and marveled over her dark nipples. I memorized the scent of her. The color of her sex like the amaranto that grew in our backyard. When she kissed me, she held my face with both hands. And even after we both came, her legs and arms were still tight around me.
She became my whole world. I told ’Buelo I was going to marry her. He called her horrible names and said I was too stupid to know what I was doing. That he’d given me everything I had and that he could take it all back. I told him that if he couldn’t respect her, I’d walk right out the door. He could have his pickup back. He could find someone else to leave his auto body shop to. That I’d walk out the door naked if I had to.
Next thing I knew there was a bright light and a red wash of blood and then I was gone. I saw ’Buelo’s shocked face for a split second. I didn’t take anything when I left my grandparents’ house. Not even my body.
Araceli cried and cried for me. I pressed kisses against her eyes. I hope she felt them.
Sol
I asked if I could have one of the small altares. Elisa didn’t laugh at me when I told her I wanted to make one for my little Luz.
Guillermo never wanted us to have a dog, so as soon as we split up, I went straight to the shelter. Luz didn’t have a name yet. He was one of five puppies that had been brought in a few days before. He was puppy #3. It was love at first sight. He was sleepy and looked like a grumpy old man. A pretty golden color all over with the blackest. eyes and nose. A white splash on his chest and neck. Luz de mi vida, I thought, he was going to be the light of my life.
And I needed a puppy’s uncomplicated and pure love. Needed to take care of him and make a home for us both.
I barely knew who I was after the wreck of my nineteen- year marriage. Guillermo and I had only tolerated each other for years, but we probably would have stayed together and just lived miserable if it hadn’t been for Estella. For the longest time I told myself I was just imagining things. That Estella was just coming by the panadería almost every morning because she just liked our coffee and pan dulce. Told myself she just wanted to be friends. We’d meet for tacos. We’d go out for drinks. We’d catch a movie together. Guillermo was glad I’d made a friend, said it gave him a chance to go hang out with his buddies without my always checking on him. Estella was fun and we had so much in common. And I told myself we were just good friends. Until I found myself with my tongue down her throat and her fingers inside me.
And I got careless or maybe I wanted Guillermo to know.
It’d been going on for several months before he came home unexpectedly, and there we were in the living room, my head between her legs.
He wasn’t even angry. We didn’t even argue. He just packed his stuff and left. We met with his attorney. I got the house, and he took everything in our accounts. Estella didn’t last very long. I didn’t have a lot of time for her. Within the year, my mom got really sick, and I took care of her until she died. My dad only lasted a few weeks after her funeral. Doctor said natural causes, no issues, he just passed away in his sleep. And I wondered what that would be like, to be loved so much your husband couldn’t live without you. They left the panadería to me. My brother got their house and the couple acres it came with.
Little Luz was there for all my grief, for all my loneliness, for all the time afterwards. He was there as I dated woman after woman and they broke my heart. I don’t think I’ve ever known what I was looking for. I just know I never found it.
Luz would come with me to the bakery. He became the unofficial mascot. He wasn’t allowed into the kitchen, of course, but he had free run of the little area where we had a couple booths for people to sit and eat at. Business was good and over the years, I started expanding. I changed the name of the panadería from Reyna’s Panadería to Mi Luz Panadería. The new sign and all our boxes and bags bore the new logo – a half sun with little Luz’s face.
Business was good. We made all the traditional pan dulce the way my parents had taught me: molletes – called conchas everywhere else – hornitos, pink cake, donas – Mexican donuts were not American donuts – marranitos, pan de polvo with cinnamon and sugar, pan de polvo with powdered sugar, strawberry jelly rolls, mantecados, churros de cajeta, orejas, tri- colored cookies, empanadas de camote and calabaza and piña and manzana, all in all enough pan dulce to fill the six- foot cases. I decided to add tacos to the menu. Added caldo and menudo on the weekend mornings. I poured every cent of profit back into the panadería. I knocked down one wall and expanded the kitchen and the seating area. More of the college kids started coming around along with families and the old retired men that needed somewhere to meet up for a few hours every day. I bought an espresso machine the same day I put in Wi- Fi. We went from closing at 3pm to 5pm to 7pm to 9pm.
I met Elisa when she came in to order pan dulce for a reception she was hosting for a friend. I’d never known an artist before and never one that wanted 200 mini marranitos and 200 mini molletes and 500 heart- shaped pan de polvo cookies. While we were talking, she ended up trying some of our caldo de pollo with shredded chicken and calabazitas and potato and rice and carrots and tomatoes and cilantro and lime juice, and before I knew it, she’d ordered enough caldo for a hundred people.
When I was directing the delivery and set up at the reception, Elisa brought me a glass of wine. I mentioned that it had been the favorite wine of an ex. She tilted her head at me for a second and said her ex had taught her to love it. Nereida, we both said at the same time. I laughed and said it made us like in-laws of in-laws, that it was too bad there was no word for the ex of an ex. In a low and dramatic voice she said, the ex of my ex is my friend, and then clasped both my hands with hers.
Elisa was the one I called when the veterinarian told me it’d be best to let Luz go. That the cancer was just too advanced and that the pain was too much for his little body.
He was with me for longer than my marriage lasted. Twenty years of his big eyes and his furry little face. Twenty years of cuddles and walks. I took him almost everywhere with me. During the hot months, I carried him, only allowing his little paws to touch grass and earth. I would think sometimes about that little rhyme, ni madre ni padre ni perro que me ladre, but it was never true for me. Because even though I was otherwise alone in the world – no mother, no father, no husband, no children, sometimes no girlfriend – I always had little Luz.
Until now. So I brought his favorite little sun- and- moon- shaped bacon treats. His favorite toy, Mr. Bebop, the little pig that squeaked when he’d carry him in his jaws, and Shushu, the rainbow glowworm. he wouldn’t sleep without. I had a thousand different photos of Luz. It took hours to choose my favorites. The base of the altar was his last dog bed and his favorite pillow. I made paper flowers to string everywhere. The last thing I added to the altar was his leash and his collar with the metal tag with his name.
My little Luz.
Feliciana
I don’t think this is the right house. I don’t know any of these people. I was passing by on the other side of street and saw a young woman I thought was my granddaughter. Her hair is just like hers. Black black and falling straight past her hips. She was carrying yards and yards of fabric in her arms. All colors, bien vivos. Lots of yellow and orange and turquoise and green. And then a bag from the mercado, all full of ribbons and lace and spools of thread.
Before the arthritis in my hands got too bad, I used to spend my days making blankets. I’d sell them at the Bargain Bazaar. I made a lot of baby blankets. Those were very popular, because they didn’t cost as much as the queen- or king- size ones. When people would complain my blankets cost too much, I’d tell them, If you want a cheap blanket, go to WalMart. You won’t find any blankets like these there. This is good fabric, everything sewn by hand, even the ruffle edging. I bought the softest, thickest cotton batting, and feel here, I layered it and stitched it into place. This blanket will last you the rest of your life – you’ll be able to pass it on to your children!
No, this girl’s not my granddaughter. She looks so serious! My nieta was always laughing. But I hear music and voices. Bien alegre. And there are people singing. I want to go listen. They won’t notice me. I won’t make too much noise. I’ll just find somewhere to sit. And someone’s making tacos – I can smell corn tortillas on the comal! O some bistec with cebollitas asadas and a squeeze of lime would be so delicious!
Yes, there’s a little comfy chair in this corner, under the tree, where the breeze is just right. And a young man, so polite, very gentlemanly, just brought me a glass of agua de jamaica with a little bit of ice, just like I like it. He says he’ll bring me the next plate of tacos.
Que bonito. There’s a lot of people here. I don’t know any of them. There are kids playing and running around with a little dog. There are so many flowers. I’ve never seen so many marigolds at the same time in my life! Then there are people gathered around the woman making tacos, waiting their turn and singing. And all these tables with photos and food and flowers and candles.
I don’t think any of those are for me, but no one’s telling me I don’t belong. Aquí me quedo.
This house must belong to that woman right there. Every person that comes in hugs her first. And she keeps pointing in one direction and then another. She’s wearing a man’s shirt that’s too big on her and the bottom of her pants are ragged – she cut them but never hemmed them. I could take care of both those things in just a few minutes. That’s how I brought in money when my children were little. Alterations. I’d fix everything – men’s suits, missing buttons, sleeve lengths, pants, church dresses, wedding gowns, quinceañera dresses, uniforms. So many uniforms – maids, cooks, nurses, mailmen, school uniforms – everything!
How nice! The young man didn’t forget me – he brought me a plate with two tacos de bistec with cilantro and grilled onion and radish slices and lime wedges. Even two rolled-up napkins.
I can’t stop looking at The Lady. She’s so beautiful. Her face peaceful, round but with strong cheekbones. Intelligent eyes. The clay of her is dark, dark. And now that the sun is setting, all the marigolds in her arms and bursting from her body make it look like she’s on fire.
She reminds me of Chela. Chela had eyes like that. Like she was always thinking. And when I’d ask her what she was thinking, she’d always make me either laugh or cry. I miss her so much. Our husbands were best friends all their lives. My mother died when I was young. My sisters were all much older than me. I’d never had a best friend until I met Chela. Roberto introduced me to her and Eligio the first time we went to the Saturday night dance at the church hall. I was seventeen. Chela was eighteen. She and Eligio had already been married for two years and had a baby boy.
I loved her so much. We took care of each other’s children. We cooked for each other’s families. We spent many holidays and birthdays together. At first, we only hugged, sometimes we sat and held each other’s hands. It wasn’t until after all our children had grown and moved away that she pulled me towards her and kissed me. And I kissed her back. It was nothing like kissing Roberto. I loved my husband, but when Chela touched me, it was like finally, everything was right and nothing was missing. We stayed with our husbands until they died but spent as much time together as we could.
Roberto died first, a heart attack when he was sixty- six. Then Eligio when he was seventy- four. Cancer. Chela and I moved in together. None of our children thought it was odd. It only made sense for two viejitas who were best friends to share a house. I never thought I would be the happiest I ever was in my life in my sixties. Every night, Chela slept in my arms. Every morning, her voice was the first sound I heard. And what a thrill I felt, every time I ran my hand down along her naked hip. After so many decades of longing, neither of us cared that our hair had gone grey, our flesh rounded and our skin loose, our joints sometimes stiff. What mattered was that we were free to reach for each other.
Now I’m just waiting for her. She comes from long- lived people. She must be in her nineties already.
I’ve been looking for her all day. She’s not in the house we lived in. She’s not in any of her children’s houses. I’m not sure if it’s been ten years or twenty already since I died. I was starting to forget things while I was still alive. But not Chela. Never Chela. I’m going to finish these delicious taquitos. Then I’ll get my things and keep on looking. I can hear her voice calling my name. And my heart was always a lit flame for her, my love spilling out of me like all the marigolds spilling out of The Lady’s arms.
Xochitl
I still can’t get used to calling her Elisa. I keep calling her Profe. She says that’s not right. I tell her, you teach a class at the university, we get to call you Profe. It just seems disrespectful to call her Elisa or Mssss!
I don’t feel like I know what I’m doing here. No matter what I do, it’s just not right. And it’s not enough. Profe says my hope has to be bigger than my despair. That I need to transform all this rage into love. But I don’t know how to do either of those things.
Most of the time art feels totally useless. Here I am, making this huge altar dedicated to lives lost crossing the border, to all the children lost at residential schools, to murdered and missing Indigenous women, to the Ayotzinapa 43, to the Latin American environmental activists that have been killed. And there’s news clippings and names and photos and all my ofrendas and I’ve laid it all out like I’d sketched it out for Profe to take a look at.
But now that it’s all here, it feels like it’s nothing. It’s just here, in Profe’s backyard for as long as this party lasts. Tomorrow, we’ll be taking it all down. Sure, she says that we’ll document it while it’s up. That it can be shared online. That I’ll have all the materials to do an installation anywhere in the future. And she says she’s going to introduce me to José Camargo – her friend, she says, her friend – like he’s not super famous. We studied his work in one of my classes. My professor literally cried when he told us about the first time he saw José Camargo’s work in person.
My altar doesn’t feel like anything. It just looks like pieces, like a kid’s collage. It doesn’t come together. It’s not one thing. It doesn’t build, it doesn’t feel natural or inevitable or forceful or anything. It doesn’t coalesce, like Profe says. It doesn’t have any moments.
She told me about an installation she saw when she was in college. Amalia Mesa Bains’ Vanidades. How it had moments where everything paused for her. How she felt alone and immersed even though she was in a gallery with other people. How much she wanted to touch the hair brush on the vanity. How in that space she might as well have been smelling her mother’s talcum powder and body soap. How the world shifted when she looked at her own face in the mirror and saw Cesar Chavez’ face superimposed over hers.
I’ve only ever made one thing that I felt really worked. It was the project I submitted at the end of my semester with Profe. Mixed media. Part earth, part fabric, partly painted, partly embroidered. A tribute to my parents. They were both musicians, gunned down by drug dealers in some no- name bar in a small town. I was sent to live with my Aunt Rosie in Utah. I was only four. She and my Uncle Bob changed my name from Xochitl to Danielle and never spoke to me in Spanish.
They couldn’t understand why I’d choose to apply to a university in South Texas. Why I’d go back to where my parents had come from. I applied and got a full scholarship. During my freshman year I drove the couple miles from the university to the courthouse and changed my name back to Xochitl. I let the blonde highlights and the coloring Aunt Rosie had insisted on grow out. I walked in the sun as much as I wanted to and watched my skin darken. I took three years of Spanish and listened to Tejano on the radio station and watched telenovelas on the Mexican TV channels until I could understand what people were saying.
I’d only ever seen my grandparents once a year when I lived in Utah. I started to spend time with them and my aunts and uncles and cousins. I started to visit my parents in the cemetery. It was in the cemetery that I knew what I wanted to do for my final project for Profe. I sat there on the ground, a bit dazed, as image after image bloomed in my mind. And then I raced home to begin. I’d never worked so hard on anything before. Never spent just hours and hours sitting with it and tracing parts of it with my fingertips and dreaming about it and talking to it. And it would tell me what else was missing. And then there was a morning when I looked at it and it was just alive. And I knew I was done.
Emma Elisa
I don’t know what made me start but once I started I knew I would never stop. It started with small drawings, with crayons and clay and watercolors. I never knew we were poor because there was always food and there was always paper and crayons and paints and clay. Mama never said anything if I used all the aluminum foil or if I cut up our towels or if I painted on the walls. Almost every day when she came to pick me up after work, she’d bring me something. Not dolls or dresses but construction paper and glue and pipecleaners and glitter.
As I got older, she bought me pencil sets and charcoals, canvases and acrylics, pastels and self- hardening clay. There was a year I picked up cross stitch and needlepoint and knitting. I had plastic bins stacked five feet tall with all my supplies and all my projects. Mama never fussed when I brought in twigs, leaves, wildflower bouquets, clumps of earth, rocks, mesquite bean pods, or bits of fallen nests.
Which is sort of what my house looks like now that I’ve lived in it alone since La Legartija left. What was a three- bedroom house no longer even has a dedicated guest room. There’s my bedroom which is also partly a studio, the second bedroom which has always been my studio, and the used- to-be guest room which has a bed hidden somewhere under my current projects. The kitchen is mostly clear, except for the breakfast nook which now has my easel and several canvases. The living room has several towers of books I’m planning to start reading, but there’s enough room for at least eight people to sit. And the dining room’s free now too. I think I threw everything I had on the dining table and the chairs in the pantry. I’ll bring it all back out after the party.
I told everybody they can party and drink all they want, but there’s nowhere to sleep except on the floor or in the backyard, where they’re free to lay out a blanket or a serape or a sleeping bag. I left out a small pile on the patio along with some old throw pillows in case anyone gets tired.
I want to do this the way Mama used to tell me she remembered it. Spend all day preparing and laying out the altars, stay up all night holding vigil, break bread all together in the morning.
Of course, my friends started drinking the moment they got here. Dusk is falling now. Most of the altares are done. Just a few people still scrambling now with finishing touches. So glad Nora came. She’s been making the most amazing tacos all day. I wasn’t sure if she was going to be all right. We’ve been friends for a decade, even dated for a little while, but I’d never known she had a son until she found out he’d died. I kept my distance while she was working on her son’s altar. There was a moment there where it seemed like she was flinging marigold petals at it. I could almost see the flowers bleeding in her hands as she twisted the petals off.
José’s been a sweetheart with the drinks. I’m so glad he’s here too. His first Dia de los Muertos without Ismael. I caught him singing earlier while he was handing out drinks. It’d been a while since I’d heard him singing. The world’s not right if he’s not singing or humming under his breath. He thinks I haven’t noticed he’s been stuffing his face with my marigolds. If he’d asked, I would have told him to eat as many as he wanted. I’m not saving them for anything. I grew them for today.
I’m glad Antonio’s here. He says his wife will come by tonight after she gets out of the hospital. He hasn’t said anything but I think he’s a little nervous about how his wife will react to the altar he created. It’s so beautiful.– it has a marvelous stillness and reverence and simplicity. Photos of his mother, his brother, his first love, and the child that was never born. White roses and sunflowers and red roses and pink and red hibiscuses. And all these gorgeous origami birds. I met Antonio at one of my favorite taquerias. I usually go at least twice a week after the lunch rush, but I went there early one day since I’d skipped breakfast. The place wasn’t busy, and we must have been at least ten feet away from each other. I was busy sketching some new ideas and must have forgotten where I was since I started singing along with the music playing on the jukebox. One of my favorite old songs from an LP my mother had inherited from her father.
I didn’t realize I was singing along until Antonio decided to join in too. I looked up in surprise. I love Los Cadetes de Linares too, he said with the widest smile. Just like that, we were friends. Before long, he told me his story. And I told him there was nothing better than art to pour your life and your stories and your pain and your love into. So he’s been trying out new things, reading me poems or stories, showing me sketches, researching different artists I tell him about and trying out different things. This is the first time he’s come over to my house. His eyes looked so large as I gave him an impromptu tour through all my messy art rooms.
Xochitl came with us too. She kept apologizing every time she reached out to touch some half- formed thing. I laughed and told her none of it would break, and if it did break, there wasn’t anything I couldn’t fix. I didn’t know when I took on the task of teaching a class at the university that I was going to end up loving all of my students. Xochitl, though, I can feel it – I’m going to know her for the rest of my life. You can practically feel the insatiable drive to learn, to create, to make sense of it all radiating off of her. She’s hard on herself, but it makes her exacting and the kind of stubborn you have to be to make art.
A couple years before I turned fifty everything changed for me. Decades of different cities, with different partners and helping to raise their children for a few years here and there, while working one IT job with health insurance after another. Mind- numbing forty- hour work weeks interrupted by a show on the East Coast, in London, in Paris, and then back to the eight- to-five. Impossible to describe what it took to split myself between the work that paid the bills and my real work for so many decades. As the years passed, my hands learned to follow what my imagination dreamed, learned to translate what my heart felt into something I could touch.
And then I heard something on the wind. And with a sudden ferocity, I wanted to come back to the Valley, to the border, to the Gulf, to the place where I grew up. I wanted the food I grew up with and the music I grew up with. I wanted to live on a palm tree- lined street and for my bougainvillea to climb my mesquite trees and spill color everywhere. I wanted a little home like this one and a life like this one and friends like these. This is where I want to live all the years I have left. In my messy house full of half- finished art. Dreaming things and making things.
Like my Lady Cempasuchil. Her face implacable and joyful. The curve of a generous hip and then a muscled thigh, a rounded shoulder and then a strong forearm. Absence and presence. All these hollow spaces within her to fill with earth, to fill with seed, to offer up to the sunlight.
She’s been complete for a week now. What I dreamed and what blossomed all coming together. Aflame.
It looks like Sol is finished with her altar for little Luz. She’s holding one of his toys in her hands, an unbearable sadness on her face. I’m going to go see if I can get Carlos to play some Angeles Azules. Sol’s never been able to resist a cumbia. I’ll see if I can pull her away to dance with me, bare feet on the grass, just so I can see her eyes light up again.
The Lady
She made me with her hands. Her hands both cool and molten. She dreamed me, she molded me, she smoothed shaped and named me. She whispered me, she sang me, she screamed muttered growled me. She called invited invoked me.
So I came. And I calmed the winds. And I calmed the border blood. I came here, to her home, modest material and human but concentrated with power as if lightning slept in it.
I have been cradling this earth and murmuring to these little blossoms. They are mine and I am theirs. And on this night of ancestors I will keep the peace. For the voices that weep for the spirits flickering through. Enter. You are welcome. But you cannot stay. Lightning lives here.
I will come and go. Blossom and burn. Sing and bloom. Bloom and bloom.
Live and live and live until the day comes when this body will fall to the ground with a thud, and lay there, collapsed like a pile of rocks.
ire’ne lara silva is the author of the collection of short stories flesh to bone (Aunt Lute Books, 2013). Her stories have appeared in The Rumpus, Apogee, Pleiades, Blue Mesa Review, The Acentos Review, and the Nepantla Familias anthology. She is the author of two chapbooks and four poetry collections, most recently Cuicacalli/ House of Song (Saddle Road Press, 2019).