Thirteen Heavens

by Mark Fishman

  ¡Bandera de México!

  Legado de nuestros héroes,

  símbolo de la unidad

  de nuestros padres y nuestros hermanos.

  Te prometemos ser siempre fieles

  a los principios de libertad y de justicia

  que hacen de nuestra Patria la nación independiente,

  humana y generosa

  a la que entregamos nuestra existencia.

  Flag of Mexico!

  Legacy of our heroes,

  symbol of the unity

  of our parents and our brothers.

  We promise to always be loyal

  to the principles of liberty and justice

  that make our fatherland

  the independent, human and generous nation

  to which we give our existence.

  But who’s going to wave a flag? not one of us, no matter how much we love our country, look ma! hands that can’t hold, fingers that can’t grasp, and they scooped our eyes out with a spoon, we all know empty sockets aren’t worth a thing, and our fathers mothers sisters brothers, too depressed and miserable to wave anything but torn bed sheets with slogans written on them, banners, placards, painted posters asking for news of their children husbands brothers, demanding justice, the least they could ask for, compañeros, so who’s got the right to wave the flag if they don’t believe in what it stands for, not the ministerial police or the federal police, not the police from Iguala, three units from Cocula, municipal police forces, together, badges guns boots uniforms, they stand behind little flags sewn on their sleeves but don’t pay any attention to what it means, I know I know, you can’t tar them with the same brush, but right now that’s what I’m doing because I didn’t see a police uniform on a human being that was trying to look after us, not one, Irma nodding her head, agreeing with me as we leave Lerdo Park, hand in hand, walking away from the bench, Irma and I, and voices come from the park behind us, they’re like echoes, a shout is a shout, sometimes I can’t tell them apart from those that arise in my dream, one foot in and one foot out, as you can tell, maybe there’re people playing soccer and the voices and shouts aren’t meant for us, but Irma turns her head to look back, just to make sure, in this life you’ve got to stay awake, keep your eyes peeled, be wise to what goes on around you, and a confirmation, she tells me it’s a group of engineering students from the campus of Universidad Tecmilenio or lab technicians from Christus Muguerza Hospital del Parque, young men kicking around a ball, cutting through the park, playing off the tension of higher education or long working hours, and we start to laugh, we both know I don’t have much of an education and not many hours to live, playing behind us while we’re taking Calle Octava, heading toward Calle Francisco Xavier Mina, walking past the back of a modern rough-textured cement church with barred windows, Immaculada Concepción, we’re making headway faster than our feet could really take us, but it’s my dream and I see it the way I want to see it, you can’t deny me a little pleasure under the circumstances—Christ! what’s that smell? please don’t tell me my corpse’s begun to stink—Irma and I, our feet following the same path in the same direction, we’re staring at an empty lot with a wire fence protecting wild grass and patches of earth, taking a right on Privada Jiménez, past Telmex, and before we know it, a couple of seconds, remember it’s my dream, we’re standing at the intersection of Calle 12a and Privada Jiménez looking at a Pemex filling station and a bright yellow Pirelli tire store, then we’re entering the Bar Pacífico, hotel and restaurant, at the corner of Ocampo and Calle Jiménez, everything happens so fast when you’re happy, when you want something to happen, not like a slow death, and mine was slow, painful, and far from tedious, the first thing, a couple of soft drinks, Coca-Cola, plenty of ice, I don’t know if we’re standing at the bar or sitting at a table, just my imagination, and if I stick to the right setting, we’re drinking a Jarritos Mexican cola, or Jarritos Tamarindo, and drinking from a straw, I admire your olive skin, my Irma of the Tigress, a fierce woman, a passionate woman, your long dark hair falling past your shoulders, so exquisite I want to eat you, extremely beautiful and, typically, delicate, that’s the definition, but you’ve got meat on your bones, muscle, too, deltoid biceps triceps, your sleeves aren’t rolled up but I’ve seen them, an elastic and narrow body with red-carpet hips, not too wide, just right, and I’d never run away from you, mi Tigresa, because “to flee is the privilege of the selfish,” which isn’t part of my personality, ask mother and father, they’ll tell you, embarrassed but truthful, and in the uncertainty of the days that go by, I love you more and more, shadows are the exclusive territory, not always of the damned, but often of the unlucky, making people suspicious of the present and afraid of the future, and I don’t want you to fall under their spell, mi Tigresa, you live in broad daylight, not shadows, smoking a Capa Flor by Puros Santa Clara, or another brand, a Te-Amo Clásico, what’s it matter? a river of blue smoke spilling from your lips, a symbol of independence for lives submerged by anxiety in the search for satisfaction and freedom, I lean forward, whispering, you’re Mexico’s reward, with the greater part of its dreams broken in pieces, shattered porcelain plates, crushed plastic dishes smeared with mole negro, mole rojo, mole verde, mole coloradito, prieto, chichilo, stains wiped clean with tortillas, in my dream I hear Rosalía saying, nuestro México, a country of ghosts, it might’ve come from Rocket, I’ll call him Rocket because my father does, otherwise it’s Rubén Arenal, too formal under the circumstances, considering that I’m starting to smell my own rotten flesh, I’m looking at Irma, my Tigress, and we’re finishing our drinks at the bar or sitting at a table, let’s say at a table, it’s more comfortable, and like that, sitting across from each other, Irma and I are holding hands, sleeves positioned discreetly between folded napkins and cutlery, and I say, yes, a serpent and an eagle are symbols of nuestro México, but what kind of bird speaks to a jaguar? that’s what I’d like to know, a cenzontle norteño? dusty gray-brown with white wing bars and sides of tail, a male zanate mexicano? iridescent black with yellow eyes and a long tail, keel-shaped, or a male mirlo azteca? boldly blackish-brown and white, upper parts obscurely brown-streaked, and with these detailed descriptions straight out of a guide to birds of Mexico, do you have the answer? and Irma tells me she’s never seen a bird speak to a jaguar, a serpent and an eagle, yes, it’s possible, one curled up in a tree, the other on a branch above it, a perfect opportunity for a conversation, but what kind of bird speaks to a jaguar? I can’t tell you, why do you want to know? and I shrug my shoulders, thinking, then asking myself the same question, why the fuck do I want to know what kind of bird speaks to a jaguar, don’t tell me I’m tripping over the branches of the sacred, divine and ridiculous, interested in the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities, creating my own myths to explain some natural or social phenomenon, not at this stage of my life, which has already ended, all our efforts to last are useless, too late for creation, too soon for death, because of all the buffeting winds, but that’s what she asks me, and I let go of her hand, waving mine at the waiter, asking for two Mexican colas with plenty of ice, straws, two menus, but we don’t look at them right away, she’s intrigued by the question concerning the large, heavily built cat, its yellowish-brown coat with black spots, and a bird that’s native to our part of the world, our region, maybe even our hometown, is it the jaguar of our ancestors? or a bobcat? is it the Blue Hummingbird, Huitzilopochtli, the patron of the Aztecs? the whole of Aztec history reflects the people’s dependence on the tribal god Huitzilopochtli, who was a form of Smoking Mirror, Tezcatlipoca, the Prince of this World, I imagine something larger than a hummingbird, in real life, more like an iridescent black male zanate mexicano with yellow eyes, and a real-life conversation, you might consider that funny coming from a half-baked dead man, it’s not my fault and I doubt you’re laughing, what makes me dead? my complexion turning from green to purple? my crumpled body? not a breath showing on the surface of a mirror? I just don’t have the right to be any plac
e on earth, my permission’s been revoked, without forewarning, no red flag, no alarm bells, no judicial order, just kidnapped, tortured and killed, and Irma and I, deciding it’d be a good idea to eat something, not wanting the sugar to be the only thing in our bloodstream, we look at the menu, choosing something right away, and the waiter’s standing next to us before we’ve waved him over to the table, and minutes later, we’re sharing a beef discada, a kind of stew from here, and warm corn tortillas, two bottles of Modelo Especial, it’s early evening, and while we’re eating we decide on the zanate mexicano, and if it’s up to me, I’ll always pick a bird that looks like a crow, so it’s a great-tailed grackle, a large and lanky blackbird, that’s going to have a heart-to-heart with the jaguar that’s waiting for us when we’re through with our meal and leave the restaurant, but that’s for later, after we’ve had coffee, and even if Bar Pacífico’s a hotel and restaurant, no hotel room for us, we don’t need one, our love is made wherever we go, Irma and I, each reaching out for the other’s hand once the dishes are cleared, glasses of beer nearly empty, we’ve ordered our coffee, and there’re only hours years eons, and forever, waiting for us, I can tell by the way she’s looking at me that that’s what she’s thinking, too, twins of love, and now twins of pain, disappearance privation forfeiture, all forms of loss, there’s no colder wind than that, the selfishness of death, you’re mine and no one else’s, and in the street again, at the corner of Ocampo and Calle Jiménez in front of Bar Pacífico where the jaguar is waiting for us, Irma lights a natural flavor Santa Clara Chicos, a blend of San Andrés short filler, or picadura, putting the tin back in her handbag, offering me a drag straight from her lips, I take it when she hands it to me, but I don’t taste anything, not even a desire to cough when I inhale the smoke deep into my lungs, and now that there’s a moon, neither waxing nor waning, just there staring at us, the jaguar getting impatient, roaring, so where’s the bird you promised I could talk to because I’ve been waiting out here with nothing to do but gaze at the evening sky while you’re filling your bellies with drink and food and love, such is the impatience of a creature in the Pantera genus, and unlike most big cats that’re solitary except for mother-cub groups, our jaguar is showing signs of feeling abandoned rejected unwanted unloved, La Tigresa notices a kind of feline frown on the jaguar’s face and jabs her elbow into my ribs until I see what she’s trying to point out to me, slow as a dead man, I guess, no other excuse, I give the jaguar a sincere smile, a few words of reassurance, come with us, it won’t be long, and the three of us cross Avenida Melchor Ocampo heading back in the direction from which we’d come when we were on our way to Bar Pacífico, Irma smoking her cigar, searching the night sky for a great-tailed grackle willing to take time before going to sleep to speak to the jaguar walking beside us, and slowing down, with the Pemex station on our left, the three of us stand still thinking which road to take, and the jaguar is the first to turn his head, a nose and ears like magnets for smells and sounds, a singular standard of perception, Irma and I taking each other’s hand without looking down, a grip as firm as a vise, we’re staring open-mouthed at what the jaguar sensed before we could see it, the Pemex station emitting a kind of night mist rolling out from behind its walls, a mist slowly separating into more than forty individual spheres, at first their glow appears round, then each of the vaporous spheres is elongated north to south, like the mystifying cloudy appearance of open cluster M44, the Praesepe or Beehive Cluster in the constellation of Cancer, a 3rd-magnitude glow that to my naked eye looks like the bearded head of a tailless comet passing between the 4th-magnitude stars Gamma and Delta Cancri—the nature of the cloud was a mystery until Galileo saw what he described as “not one only but a mass of more than forty small stars”—and in ancient China that misty glow was seen as Tseih She Ke, “exhalation of piled-up corpses,” proof before my eyes, I didn’t need more, the Chinese were right, the faces I recognize as they come out of the unstable mist, more than forty of them, forty-three to be exact, are the details of an emanation of dead bodies from the Pemex gas station, it’s my dream, and one by one they make their identity known to me, there they are across the street, and moving solemnly in a column toward Calle 12a, a convoy of corpses, I speak in a whisper so I don’t disturb them, Irma and the jaguar, tactful and well-mannered, both listening with humble submission and respect to the names of the disappeared, Miguel Ángel Hernández Martínez, Jesús Jovany Rodríguez Tlatempa, Abelardo Vásquez Penitén, Alexander Mora Venancio, Luis Ángel Abarca Carrillo, Jorge Álvarez Nava, Adán Abraján de la Cruz, Cristian Tomás Colón Garnica, Luis Ángel Francisco Arzola, José Ángel Navarrete González, Jorge Aníbal Cruz Mendoza, Giovanni Galindes Guerrero, Jhosivani Guerrero de la Cruz, Carlos Lorenzo Hernández Muñoz, Israel Jacinto Lugardo, my head’s starting to spin, my stomach’s sick, but I don’t let go of Irma’s hand, I squeeze it until it hurts both of us, an involuntary contraction of her facial features at the pain she hears in my voice, don’t go on, she says, and I tell her I can’t go on, it’s killing me, but what am I saying, I know I’m already dead! the more-than-forty small stars pass single file before our eyes, I can’t bear to look at them, afraid I’ll see myself amongst the star-corpses marching in a straight line that bends at the corner, turning down Calle 12a, a glimpse at the jaguar tells me the animal isn’t insensitive to what’s happening, wiping away tears with a raised paw, and the names coming out of my mouth, clutching Irma’s hand or lying here in a heap with my compañeros, no boundary or limit’s fixed between my dream and reality, no dividing line, not now, but I’m still here, lying on top of my comrades, and I ask myself who, living or dead, can look through a stack of bodies, not my eyes, human eyes, maybe eyes looking down from Heaven, the names spill softly out of my mouth thanks to the free and unmerited favor of God telling me who’s here in this human stack of wood, José Ángel Campos Cantor, Julio César López Patolzín, Everardo Rodríguez Bello, Cutberto Ortiz Ramos, Felipe Arnulfo Rosas Rosas, Christian Alfonso Rodríguez Telumbre, Martín Getsemany Sánchez García, César Manuel González Hernández, Jonás Trujillo González, Jorge Luis González Parral, Israel Caballero Sánchez, now it’s not just my head that’s spinning, the street’s in a whirlpool, and I’m drawn in to its rapidly rotating mass, physically as well as psychologically, a turbulent situation from which it’s hard to escape, I’m passing out, fainting, my fingers loosening their grip on Irma’s hand, moving downward, dropping, falling into a black pit, before I lose consciousness I’ll finish giving names to the faces I see whether mine’s one of them or not: José Eduardo Bartolo Tlatempa, Abel García Hernández, Doriam González Parral, Miguel Ángel Mendoza Zacarías, Bernardo Flórez Alcaraz, Carlos Iván Ramírez Villareal, Magdaleno Rubén Lauro Villegas, Leonel Castro Abarca, José Luis Luna Torres, Mauricio Ortega Valerio, Jorge Antonio Tizapa Legideño, Antonio Santana Maestro, Emiliano Alen Gaspar de la Cruz, Marco Antonio Gómez Molina, Marcial Pablo Baranda, Saúl Bruno García, Benjamín Ascencio Bautista, and yours truly, an honorary dead, not on the list, that makes more than forty-three, I know, but it’s the truth, all the star-corpses disappear going who knows where on Calle 12a, and so I fall into a deep sleep that isn’t sleep at all but a kind of stepping aside out of the flow of traffic, observing what transpires there on byways and highways with passionate indifference since as interested as I am in what’s happening before my eyes I can’t do anything to affect or influence any of it, the physical side of life is out of reach, but since it’s my dream, I won’t let that stop me, so out of my way! clear off! can’t you see that I’m walking here, my legs don’t move my eyes don’t see, but I’ve got places to go, my body’s left me behind, but my soul won’t rot, I’m determined to keep it fresh, Irma and I continue our stroll, we’re holding hands, the jaguar padding alongside us, its sway discreet, the night caressing our skin, all three of us, with a warm breeze, the jaguar’s fur unruffled and soft to the touch, we’re walking along Privada Jiménez, leaving the misty star-corpses, including my own, forty-three
plus one, to continue on their journey, wherever they’re going, while we pass Calle Octava, Calle Sexta, Calle 4a, Calle Segunda, rough fragments of stone, concrete debris at the corner of Privada Jiménez and Avenida Independencia, we’re following Privada Jiménez on into the night, arriving at Calle Tercera, “To my knowledge, English observer John Herschel was the first to call M44 the Beehive. In his 1833 Treatise on Astronomy, Herschel writes, ‘In the constellation Cancer, there is … a luminous spot, called Praesepe, or the Beehive, which a very moderate telescope—an ordinary night glass, for instance—resolves entirely into stars,’” and using a very moderate telescope, in this case a pair of intelligent bright eyes, Irma again jabbing me in the ribs, not trying to point out an unloved unwanted jaguar, but the presence of the bird the jaguar’s been waiting for that’s flying high above us, I let go of Irma’s hand, she let go of mine, now the three of us can each take our own way to follow the bird, we have to do it by sight because the sun isn’t out, the bird throws no shadow, we follow it, turn left at Calle Tercera, and go quickly past a white wall painted with pale blue letters spelling, “FUT BOL RAPIDO,” and below it, “REVO,” Irma’s eyes spot the bird sailing into the recreation area on our right, where lights illuminate an open space with two basketball courts, a double court for two simultaneous games, four hoops altogether, located beneath the gaze of a nearby mountain and foothills, the bird lands on one of the four white basketball hoops, none of them have a net, and the three of us stand in a semicircle under the hoop looking up at the yellow eyes of a zanate mexicano, the exact bird we’ve been searching for, the jaguar stretches itself out comfortably on the ground within the four-foot NBA standard radius outside the hoop, its huge yellow eyes with round pupils meeting the yellow eyes of the male bird, a jaguar’s eyes are six times better than ours at night, and it’s the great-tailed grackle that’s got the first thing to say, paraísos duros de roer, heaven’s a tough nut to crack, and we all laugh, me out of nervousness, the others for reasons I don’t know, but I admit to Irma, whispering, that that’s the best introduction to an informal exchange of ideas between creatures I’ve heard in a long time, and the jaguar clears its throat, a signal for Irma and me to leave them alone for a conversation that’ll be fortified with the kinds of truths only animals are privy to, our fingers interlaced once more, leaving the basketball courts and heading automatically for the playground on the other side of the fence, walking past the sign that reads, Parque Revolución, which in my dream is empty, heading in the general direction of El Panteón de la Regla, on Calle Nicolás Bravo, where Francisco Villa isn’t buried, but it’s the children’s recreation area we’re going to, and since it’s my dream, I decide to sit with Irma in the sandbox where little children play, she didn’t want to sit in the sand at first, she’s wearing a dress that she doesn’t want to spoil with sand or anything else, but I convince her, patting the sand next to me, cool and moist in the night, removing my lightweight jacket, laying it out for her to sit on, Irma tucks her dress under her legs as she gets comfortable, I put my arm around her waist, drawing her as close to me as she can be, our hips touch, I can feel the warmth of her skin, and smell her sweat mixed with the perfume I gave her before I left for Ayotzinapa in the municipality of Tixtla, never once thinking I wouldn’t see her again, and but for this dream, which has brought us together, it would’ve been true, lying here now on top of my dead schoolmates, in a state of decay, I remember that I traveled from Guerrero to Chihuahua just to be with Irma, even if it was only to see her for a couple of days, that’s before I gave her the bottle of perfume, the night of the perfume was the last time, on my second visit, then it was back to Ayotzinapa, and you know the rest of what happened, up to the point that we’ve disappeared, and nobody’s going to find us, not our bodies, not our flesh or bones, up in smoke, like I said, where we’re sitting, the sand’s a bit hard, not too hard, and a little moist, but that’s because it’s night, the sand’s cooled off, I lean forward, still right next to Irma, and start digging in the sand with my fingers, not looking for anything but making a pile of sand like I was going to start a sandcastle or something, the jaguar and the great-tailed grackle are busy talking, I can’t hear the bird, but now and then the jaguar’s repetitive cough, or grunting uhs, increasing in tone and power, while decreasing in frequency between grunts, typically seven to a dozen grunts, but I don’t understand a word, neither does Irma even if she’s known as La Tigresa—the Yanomami call the jaguar the “Eater of Souls,” consuming the spirits of the dead—Irma puts her cigar out in the sand, she’s wearing a frustrated look on her face, but it isn’t time for holding hands or doing anything else, no chance of intimacy at the moment of the greatest intimacy, it’s time to say goodbye, she knows it, and that’s why she’s looking sad, my pile of sand isn’t the point, the point is the hole I dug, Irma drops her cigar butt into the hole, starts filling in the hole with the sand piled up next to it, once finished, she pats it down gently, spreading wide the fingers of her hand, pressing it into the sand where she leaves her hand’s impression for all the world to see.