"The Silence of the Hummingbird"

by James N. Powell

[Traducción de Rosario Ramos F.]
(Edición bilingüe Castellano-Inglés)

"Cherry Blossoms" by 1913,
Oil on canvas, Private Collection.

SHORT NARRATIVE

       The stony trot of a couple of burros, the clang of church bells, the sounds of car motors and radios—all were drowned in the thunder of the locomotive as it hissed, wailed and screeched down the slopes from Mexico City. Santiago —dressed impeccably in a white linen suit—took in the passing countryside: white towers of churches in town squares, colors of fleeing parrots, stands of trees seething with crows, a barefoot girl standing quietly among tall sunflowers.

       The spring break was just beginning, and Santiago was looking forward to visit with his University of Mexico classmate Enrique, who lived in a small village in the mountains above Vera Cruz. Santiago had been raised in a large colonial town, could claim some European ancestry, and felt it would be amusing to see how rural Mexicans, rich in Indian blood, lived.

       There was no glass in the train windows, so that with each passing kilometer the rushing air grew warmer and more humid, and Santiago was soon sweating profusely. He had nothing to wipe his brow with but the back of his hand, and it was not long before his discomfort forced him to take off his suit jacket and unbutton the top of his shirt. Two seats in front of him a peasant was taking a sip from a canteen, and Santiago was beginning to regret his choice of clothing.

       It seemed to Santiago as if the train would never arrive, because as it chugged slowly to a stop at each little town, he began to think that each little town looked exactly the same and he began to grow impatient—not only with the progress of the train but with the very idea of Mexico. After all, Santiago surveyed his environment with two stunning blue eyes. His grandfather had been Spanish, and these facts had always led Santiago to regard himself as being a cut or two above your run-of-the-mill Mexican. And so, bored of looking out at the Mexican landscape as it rolled past, Santiago began to daydream about that proud man—his grandfather--and of how he wrote beautiful poetry and created beautiful designs on fabrics at the textile mill where had worked, and of how he drank and laughed with his artist friends until late in the evenings in smoky cafes, and of how he had married the town beauty—Natalia. But especially Santiago daydreamed of how his grandfather had spoken with Natalia, in their entire marriage, only five times.

       It was this fact that captivated Santiago whenever he thought of his grandfather—and just as the rumblings and clangings of the train drowned out the sounds of the church bells and rivers it passed, the thought of his grandfather's silence drowned out the sounds of the train. Santiago found himself thinking of his grandmother—her frail but still beautiful white face framed with black lace—explaining that his grandfather had spoken each of the four times after her labor when she came to him with the newborn child in her arms. She would hold up the child toward him, and he would say only "What color are the eyes?"

       Santiago's grandfather had first noticed her when she was a girl of twelve. He had noticed her because she was the daughter of one of his friends—a painter. When he had told the painter he wanted to marry his daughter, the man had refused. Thus, Santiago's grandfather had had to wait until the girl turned fifteen before he could take her as his wife. It was at her fifteenth birthday party that she had first danced with him. And for her, that had been it. His movements were as fluid as a river's, and in his arms, she felt herself floating.

       After marriage, his life with her had been one of silence. He loved her. She loved him. But he directed her only with his eyes. He spoke to her only with his eyes. He seduced her, scolded her and succored her only with glances. And in that silence they had learned to drink from deep wells of being.

       After they had lived together for a few years, one day Natalia hired an old widow to help with the housework. When Santiago's grandfather had come home from partying with his artist friends he saw the old woman. Then he went to his wife. He told her he did not like old women, and that she would have to let her go. This was the fifth and last time he had spoken to her.

       And so Santiago had long thought of his grandfather as a god-like being, and he wished that he, too, could marry a beautiful child, live with her in silence, and seduce and scold her with only his eyes.

       When the conductor barked out "Acatlan" Santiago was soaked from head to toe.

§

       The first thing Santiago noticed about the pack of young men at the depot—dressed in white playera shirts and pants—was that each wore a leather belt, a holster and a pistol. Enrique greeted Santiago with a sweaty handshake, and Santiago, tossing his head and laughing, pointed to his friend's pistol and joked, a little nervously, "Expecting banditos?"

       The men smiled at Enrique, and Enrique looked at the men and smiled. Then they all laughed. Enrique's fingers moved to the butt of his pistol. He withdrew it slowly from its holster, held it up, examining the sheen of the barrel in the strong sunlight. "Nope, amigo" he grinned. "We just use these to shoot at monkeys that get into the orchards."

       "Oh!" laughed Santiago, still a little nervous, slapping Enrique on the back, "Monkeys!" The other men laughed, too, and Enrique picked up one of Santiago's bags. He looked at Santiago standing there in his wet shirt, holding a suit jacket in his hands.

       "Expecting el Presidente?"

       Everyone laughed again, and then there was a moment of awkward silence.

       "Hot?" asked Enrique.

       "Yes, yes. . .I'm soaked. Is there somewhere I can take a shower?"

       "Come," Enrique said.

       Santiago picked up his other bag, and the group walked together down the dirt street of the village. The buildings were of many colors: bright yellow, pink, red—and many were two or three stories high. On the second story there were large balconies with ornate iron railings. Almost everyone greeted Enrique and the men as they passed, and the girls looked at the young dandy who walked with a white suit jacket slung over his shoulder, and who moved like a puma.

       Beyond the last building Santiago saw that the dirt road entered a mango orchard. Even in the shade, it was still hot as they walked along in the dappled light. On the other side of the orchard, the road led to a line of greenery and a bridge. Beyond these, the horizon was a broken skyline of mountains.

       The men walked down the road to the bridge. When they reached it, their boots sounded on the wood planks. They stopped and leaned out over the railing. The water flowing down from the mountains was clear and looked cool. One of the men cleared his throat and spat into the water. Santiago heard voices coming from beneath the bridge. He leaned out and looked under. A path left the road and circled around under the bridge. There in the deep shade next to the water, it looked cool, and there loitered men and boys—some swimming, some just sitting nude in the shade, some smoking cigarettes. Beyond the reedy shallows the current was swift, and he could make out the dark forms of large fish finning silently.

       On the opposite bank, beyond the reeds, and muted by distance--the shrieks of girls could be heard above the sound of the river. From a distance Santiago could see them moving among the reeds, and a few girls swimming in the open river.

       "This looks great!" said Santiago.

       "OK, let's jump in!" Enrique said. He picked up one of Santiago's bags. Santiago picked up the other, and the men began walking down the path that led under the bridge.

§

       The window of the guest room looked out over the mango orchards, towards the river. On the wall was a niche with a small statue of the Virgin. Santiago was resting on the bed, chatting with Enrique, when a dark-haired beauty walked into the room.

       Santiago and Enrique stood up. "Santiago, meet Rosa, my sister."

       Santiago looked into her luminous brown eyes. He nodded warmly, but did not speak.

       What surprised Santiago was the moment he saw her, it was as if he had seen green thunder. Enrique's mother brought in a candle, placing it in the niche in the wall, and Rosa stretched herself out on the bed where he and Santiago were lounging and began to talk with Enrique as Santiago listened, talking on and on about a place on the coast, far away, where the palm trees grow and the blue sea crashes on the shore and the white sand stretches on for miles and miles. They talked of the dark shadows of fish in the river and of the arrow snakes in the jungle and monkeys in the mango orchards and of a blind old man who plays his guitar sweetly in the town square, and their own shadows danced in a garden of muted flame as Santiago found himself drowning in the humid swellings of syllables rising and falling between Rosa's laughter and the naked flashings of her eyes.

       Sometime later the three of them fell asleep, surrounded by night and the immense breathing of the forest.

§

       In his dreams it is always a mysterious woman Santiago dreams of. In his dreams he always takes her to the coast. They follow a dirt road to a small fishing village. Santiago arranges with a fisherwoman in the town to bring them some breakfast the next morning. Then he and the woman take off their shoes and walk in the sand, far down the beach, where they are all alone.

       Night comes with its thousand thousand stars and the waves crash on the sand.

       In the morning, the Mexican woman brings a basket containing sweet tamales, beans, fish, salsa and mango. She smiles a little when she sees the patterns the two bodies have made in the sand during the night. Then she leaves.

       The mysterious woman takes a palm leaf from a tree, kneeling in silence before it, she spreads it out. Silently, as if upon an altar, she places the tamales, the beans, the fish, the salsa and then the mango.

Santiago sees himself kneeling on the other side of the palm leaf. They take their meal in silence.

§

       The next day Santiago was floating in the current, beyond the reed beds, around a turn in the river, when out of the blue of a whirlpool Rosita appeared, bare breasted, waist-deep in water. Santiago saw her and stood up also, his eyes looking up at the sky, his hands in front of his body, covering his manhood, in the pose of Adam.

       "Come swim with me!" Rosa beckoned."

       Santiago lowered his gaze for a moment. His eyes drank in Rosa 's brown body glazed with river water, her inviting eyes, her smile. He started to say something, but then dove into the current. Swimming underwater, downstream, he could hear only the sound of his heartbeat.

§

       In Acatlan, as in many Mexican towns, the church presides over the town square. Thus it is natural that here, on Sundays after church, the villagers congregate. After the church bells have stopped ringing, the blind old man plays his guitar, families promenade, and the young people engage in an age-old courtship ritual—young women strolling counterclockwise around the square, and young men strolling in the opposite direction.

       If you are a young man, and as you stroll, and a young woman should give you one violet, this is normal. It is an act of friendship.

       If, another time you stroll past each other, and she gives you a second violet, this means that she likes you. It is more than just friendship.

       A young man can know a woman many months or even years, and he may, on any given Sunday receive only two violets from her.

       If you should stroll past her yet again, and she gives you a third violet, it means she wants to go walking with you.

       With all its smiles and glances and feigned disinterest and silent flirtations and flowers—Santiago became fond of this ritual. He didn't need to say anything, only to move—as if through air—nonchalantly.

       And it was because of the ritual, after Rosa gave him his third violet, that he took his first walk alone with her. They ambled down through the town, through the orchards, and Rosa led him along a path that wound through the greenery along the riverbanks to a deep pool with large boulders half-submerged in the water. Because it was far away from where the villagers usually swam, it was a private place.

       It became their daily habit to walk there. At first Rosa would laugh and joke as they walked along, but soon she learned simply to walk in silence, beside Santiago, taking in the birdsongs, the sounds of the insects and sensing the movements of Santiago's moving, as they walked hand-in-hand.

       And so, silently they would arrive at the pool, disrobe, dive into the cool waters and then stretch out on the boulders to bask in the sun.

§

       The night before Santiago was to leave Acatlan, Rosa organized a party in his honor. Because Santiago didn't drink, Enrique's mother served him Turkish coffee in little white cups. All the girls and boys from the village had come, and when the needle was placed on the first record, Santiago took Rosa 's hand and led her to the space that had been cleared for dancing. The young men leaned lustily into the steps, and the liquid limbs of the young maidens began to swim under their skirts, their necks curved like the necks of cellos.

       In his home town everyone agreed that Santiago, even from a young age, was one of the best dancers, and with his good looks, every time he took to the dance floor, women seemed to float and blossom in his arms, like so many flowers. And so it was that Santiago's mother had begun to chide him—calling him "chupamirto"—hummingbird—and Santiago would tease her back—saying—"Maybe I am the flower—and they are the hummingbirds."

       And on this night, it was no different than at home. Protected by the music, Santiago was able to reign in complete silence, taking each girl into his world, guiding each using only the touch of his hand, the inflection of his torso--the insinuations of his eyes.

§

       Santiago's train was scheduled to leave in only one hour. He was sitting with Enrique at a breakfast of huevos rancheros with papaya and cold hibiscus tea when Rosa came into the kitchen.

       "Would you like to come to the station with us?" asked Enrique.

       Rosa smiled, paused for a moment, and then said to Santiago: "When you see what is in your bed, maybe you will not want to leave. She then, quickly disappeared.

       Santiago looked at Enrique. Enrique shrugged his shoulders. Santiago then got out of his chair and walked up the stairs to the guest room. The door of the guest room was closed.

       Santiago placed his hand on the knob and turned it. He pushed the door open. There, on his bed, awaited dozens of calla lilies—one from each girl at the party.

§

       Santiago did not take the train home that day. He stayed on—and each day he and Rosa continued to walk—silently-- to the secret pool in the river, where they would disrobe, cool off in the waters, and then bask silently in the sun.

       One day, as Rosa was half-slumbering on a boulder beside Santiago, she was awakened by a sudden whirring. A banana tree grew over the pool, and a hummingbird was hovering and sipping just above them. Also drawn to the flower, a wasp, was trying to drive off the hummingbird. But the hummingbird was more agile, dancing around the aggressor as it sipped from the flower.

       Santiago and Rosa watched until the bird had drunk its fill. Then, suddenly, as if the sky had opened and began to rain, Santiago began to speak.

       He began telling her a story about his mother—about when he and his brothers had visited her—after his grandfather's death. He said he had been sitting with his brothers, talking with his mother, when she had excused herself and gone into her bedroom. From where they were sitting, they could hear her putting on a record. They heard the needle touch the plastic and make that scratching sound before the music begins. It was—Santiago said--one of their mother's favorite songs: "Lisbon Antigua," In Old Lisbon.

       Santiago said that his mother then began singing to the music. It was extraordinary—he emphasized. It was—he said—the first time they had ever heard her sing.

       There was a pause.

       Rosa could hear her heart beating wildly, but she tried to remain calm. "How . . . how does the song go?" She stammered.

       There was another pause. Then, softly, Santiago began singing the lyrics.

       Rosa did not say a word. She did not breathe. She remained utterly still.

Podéis poneros en contacto con el autor:

James N. Powell
coyote@west.net

Copyright ©2006 James N. Powell