The Toltec Art of Life and Death. Barbara Emrys

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      Qué pues! What have you done to my daughter?” don Leonardo demanded. The university campus was gone. Sarita was lying on the grass within a cemetery park, her bag clutched to her chest and a bare foot exposed to the sun. She was barely conscious, hearing noise but unable to derive meaning from it.

      As she lingered on the edges of a dream, cars pulled up to the curb close by. People gathered near an elegant elm tree, all of them dressed in black. They exchanged quiet greetings and a few tears as they prepared to bury a loved one.

      Lala, apparently unaware of the scene around her, knelt beside Sarita, stroking her gray hair and clutching her hand.

      “I did nothing!” she barked, her voice strained with worry. Lala was feeling an odd sort of fear, suspecting that Sarita had become too exhausted to pursue her cause. She could not let that happen. Miguel must not be allowed to die. His existence was important to all of them, but few knew how important he was to Lala.

      “Well, then,” the old man retorted, “why is she lying like a stupefied eagle, wingless and insensible?” Having only just caught up with his daughter, he berated himself for leaving. He worried that his absence might have weakened her resolve.

      “Where are we?” asked Lala, looking up at the growing crowd of mourners. “What event is this?”

      “The funeral of Sara’s son, Memín.”

      “And the other? Where is he now?”

      “Miguel is there, in this peculiar memory, standing at his mother’s side.”

      Lala looked through the crowd until she spotted him, an eleven-year-old standing close to his mother and looking up at her face as she sobbed savagely. As other relatives moved in to console her, she turned from her son to fall into the arms of her husband. Losing sight of his parents in the crush of people, Miguel edged carefully away, studying the scene from the shade of the elm tree, where his older brothers had gathered in troubled silence.

      “This is bad,” said his grandfather from his post beside Sarita. “No one is attending to the boys. Yes, they are almost grown, except for Miguel, but this is a heartbreak for them, too. How is it that we neglect the innocent, the uninitiated, in our selfish wish to grieve?”

      “Oh, they are initiated,” the redhead responded, anxiously rubbing Sarita’s wrist. “They have already memorized the script to this piece of human theater. They will survive, of course, by donning their costumes and shouting their well-rehearsed lines to the balcony, just like everyone else. To tell the truth, this is what makes me enthusiastic about humankind. Mindful drama.”

      Don Leonardo looked at her, astonished. “Mindful?”

      “Just look,” she said. “You are a great one for looking.”

      The two of them turned to watch the assembly of mourners. Everyone was now crowded around the grave site in a tight circle—men, women, small children, and bewildered teenagers. Sara, the grieving mother, was at the center. A priest could be heard speaking, but he was barely visible within the throng. Then, after a few moments, even his words were lost, for a wailing rose from the group that was both chilling and disquieting, a sound that obliterated every other sound. Rising from the initial soft moan of one woman’s grief, there came a chorus of moans that grew and grew until it felt like a torrent of sorrow, the hymn of a thousand bereaved mothers. Beneath its refrain thrummed the resonant murmur of men, comforting and consoling. The noise swept skyward, up and around in random circles, until it finally reached a crescendo and plummeted to Earth. Up and down it went—swirling, spiraling, plummeting. In the midst of its fury, the priest shouted out, inviting the bereaved to offer parting gifts to the deceased—flowers, notes, rosaries. As the mourners began performing their ritual farewells, the sorrowful background voices began to falter. Wailing settled into whimpering. Finally, the cacophony faded to scratchy silence, like a musical masterpiece lost in the final grooves of an old phonograph record. The funeral was over, and the crowd scattered onto the grassy hillside in separate little bunches, each one advancing toward a waiting car.

      Throughout this remarkable scene, little Miguel stood by the elm tree where he had earlier gone to join his brothers. After the brothers had joined the group at the gravesite, Miguel remained by himself, watching and listening. Don Leonardo kept his attention on the boy; he followed the whimsical patterns and images that moved through the youngster’s mind. The child was seeing the drama—the great skirmish of emotion that was playing out in front of him—without submitting to the spell of it. As Leonardo dreamed with the boy, he began to relax and to remember, his mouth curling into a sly smile that flitted across his face and found refuge in his knowing eyes.