Zoologies by Alison Hawthorne Deming

Author:Alison Hawthorne Deming
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781571318992
Publisher: Milkweed Editions
Published: 2015-09-28T00:00:00+00:00

Black Vulture

Punta Chueca is a dry and hungry village, a clutter of cement-block houses, ocotillo-rib fences, hairless black dogs and mangy chickens, and a few hundred Seri Indians who have made a more or less permanent encampment on a bleached little crook of sand protruding from the infernal southern reaches of the Sonoran Desert into the Sea of Cortés. Nomadic people accustomed for centuries to moving when water grew scarce, the Seris are pretty new to the idea of staying put. Their parched home ground led them never to camp for more than a month or two in one place. As recently as the 1950s their homes were built of brush and sea turtle bones, their weight on the land slight and brief. But now they have the heavy goods of civilization: cement, electricity, convenience store, and satellite dish.

I went there to meet a friend who had been visiting the village for twenty-five years. His friendship among the Seris helped to soften the feeling that my presence there was something hard. He had arranged for us to camp on Isla Tiburón with a local guide and a small group of American students interested in learning how the loss of native language was eroding the Seris’ knowledge about indigenous plants and animals. What is this animal’s name? Where does it live? What does it use to build its nest? What does it eat? Does it lay eggs? When? How many? What stories do you know about this animal? When is this plant harvested? Is it used for food or medicine? They asked the children in Spanish, the elders in the Seri language. Every animal, some plants used to have a song. They taught us a few. One about the horned lizard who had gone out to gather firewood, loading it on his back as he climbed into the ironwood tree. Come here, come here, the people in the village called, bring us that firewood. But ants had begun to crawl up his legs and bite him. With all that wood on his back, he could not get them off, lost his balance, and fell out of the tree. Every time someone sang this song, the Seris lit up, shaking their heads and muttering with affection, “Pobrecito, pobrecito.” Poor little one. The lizard, it seemed, carried their burdens, along with his own. He shared humanity with them; they shared animality with the lizard.

A woman told us about a mushroom that looks like a penis, but refused to say more, explaining, “I am a Christian.” Then an older woman sang its song. The others laughed so loud we never caught the words, but the woman was too modest to sing it again. She only would say that it was very dirty.

It was in this place that I found myself an accidental tourist in the territory of birds. I did not plan for this to happen, nor did I regret it. We set out across the Infiernillo Channel for Isla Tiburón, five visitors in all, in the care of Ernesto Molina, our Seri guide.

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