The rooster in question is four feet tall. He’s one of those rare, proud birds that struts less with hubris or panache as much as dignity, really. Don Martin gets a little emotional when he talks about the bird’s scarlet cape and glowing iridescent epaulets. He’s not a kind bird, sure, but then a bird doesn’t win enough fights to buy his trainer a house on the edge of town by making friends. So no, the rooster is not for sale, and no, you may not kill him.
To hear Don Martin tell it this bird is a hero. Even when the Riera brothers could not be beaten and killed half the birds in Huehuetenango, his charge flapped and bit and clawed its way to stand above their bleeding foul. To hear Don Martin tell it without that rooster there in the woods they never would have learned that the Riera brothers soaked their gaffs in snake venom. Without that bird the Riera brothers might still be around, fixing fights and cheating and stealing.
Of course our story’s coward’s spanish is not so good and so he does not hear Don Martin tell it at all. It talks so much so early, our coward says, I cannot sleep at night. You know that popular wisdom gives that roosters crow at dawn, but it turns out they’re actually at it pretty much all the goddamn time.
The sun is up before six in the morning and by nine the shadows offer short, stunted refuge from an already scorching day. Our coward squints against the glare and stands dumbly, quietly, as both men have presented their positions to deaf ears and stand awkwardly while they wait for the other to relent.
Don Martin is not a tall man, but still holds his hand to his shoulder to show the height of the bird. Muy peligroso, he says, and waves behind him to the jungle before going back to his chores. No vaya al bosque.
You’ll learn not to hear it, she says, through the twisted iron fence that divides their balcony in two. Her legs drape through the railing and she blows smoke through her nose. Might take a few weeks, but you’ll learn not to hear it. Anyway, you’re going to be late.
She mashes the butt against her concrete perch and lurches to her feet to walk inside. I think that bird is actually pretty dangerous, though, and disappears through the curtain across the door.
El Cuarto de Tula
The jukebox is broken and only plays that Lenny Kravitz version of American Woman, so more often than not it sits unplugged in the corner ... Read more
Lay of the Land
Southern Louisiana, and specifically the portions of New Orleans in the lowlying, poor neighborhoods, has an undeniably apocalyptic feel. This occurs through a conspiracy of ... Read more