City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works Dissertations and Theses City College of New York 2012 An Invisible Decade Elizabeth Nunez CUNY City College How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cc_etds_theses/447 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] An Invisible Decade Elizabeth Nunez Linsey Abrams May 7, 2012 “Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts of the City College of the City University of New York.” An Invisible Decade Page 1 Can a beginning dictate an end? Perhaps the ending is always the beginning. I simply know that I lived a beginning, an ending and everything in between. DeLuna An Invisible Decade Page 2 .1 1990 “Look closely, what do you see?” she asked me that humid summer day in the Dominican Republic in her sanctuary. I ran out of there with images in my head that told me stories I was not supposed to know at the age of ten. That summer like every other summer, I traveled to the Dominican Republic and visited Grandma Bella. I sat quietly next to Grandma in the white and pink stripe rocking chair made of thick rubber. During a Barceló commercial she got up to check on the beans and oxtails, she was making for dinner. I followed her to the kitchen to keep her company. I loved to hear her stories of magic. I sat on a chair as she stirred the oxtails, my head perked up eager to hear a new story. I could smell the mixture of oregano, cilantro, red pepper, sour orange, and beef. I didn’t like oxtails very much but I loved anything Grandma cooked. That summer day I didn’t like the story Grandma told me, because the story was about me. Today, I look back and the same feeling still invades me. That shadow of shame still whispers softly in my ear, “You can try to be like them, but you’re one of us.” I read the books at an early age and understood that people like us, brujas, had been rejected since the moon was placed in the heavens. We were not only living women but we were women of life. Women who could look into the eyes of strangers and see their past and future; women who knew that dreams meant more than an unconscious thought; women who saw the pain of love at the shore of the ocean and still jumped into the deepness of the waters without fear of drowning; women who An Invisible Decade Page 3 danced with sorrow and slept with laughter; women who dared to live beyond the limits of their time. Of all the stories I read, there was one that stood out to me the most, El vuelo de una bruja joven. Once upon a time in the Dominican Republic there was a young girl named Isidra. Isidra and her twin sister were the spitting image of their mother. Their hair was a long wavy walnut color that shone from a distance. Their eyes were as blue as the sea and their skin the color of cinnamon. Their beauty and kind nature scared their father; he didn’t want anybody to hurt them or to take advantage of their innocence. For this reason, he had them schooled at home and prohibited them from going out with friends. Isidra spent those lonely years experimenting with the gift she had discovered in a state of boredom, magic. In the evenings, when everyone slept, Isidra and her sister grabbed a broom from under their bed and headed to the back of the house. Isidra would climb on top of the broom and take off flying as she sang a soft and melodic lullaby. She would fly to the highest plantain tree as she sang to the moon. She hid her beauty under the branches as she observed the moon with curiosity. Her sister watched her fly away in astonishment every night. Hoping that one day she could join her. One cloudy evening Isidra took flight as she always did. One of the ‘tumbadores,’ who were responsible for catching, revealing, and killing the brujas, heard her song as he sat under the plantain tree. He climbed up the tree and grabbed Isidra before she could fly away. He was in shock, brujas were all supposed to be evil, old, and deformed women who cursed people and sucked children’s blood. Brujas never revealed themselves. She looked at him with frightened eyes and he couldn’t help but desire her. An Invisible Decade Page 4 The tumbador feared that she would put a spell on him and before she could speak he recited a special ritual. She collapsed in his arms as the broom in her hand slipped onto the softness of the green grass on the ground. He closed his eyes and kissed her gently on the lips, knowing that she would never feel his love for her. Her twin sister waited up for her all night but Isidra never returned. Her father looked for her frantically to no avail. One neighbor entered the house out of breath that afternoon, “Isidra is being accused of being a bruja. They’ve taken her to the Indian River where she has been tied and is awaiting punishment.” Her Mom silently cursed the day she went to that witch and asked for a remedy to help her conceive. The crowd of people stood at a distance afraid of the youngest bruja they had ever seen. They were confused by her beauty and her willingness to die. Her mother begged for mercy as the tumbador that found her covered her body with gasoline. He wanted to save her but he knew that they would find them and kill them both. He looked her in the eyes as he lit a match and threw it at her. His heart speeding as the flame traveled through her body. Her twin sister, devastated by her sister’s tragedy, climbed to the top of the rock and jumped into the depth of the Indian’s River, knowing that she would never return. “Come with me.” Grandma covered the pot with a bright yellow plate and walked past the kitchen, past the patio with the wild chickens and the dog missing an eye, and into the little room that had the shape of an attic, her sanctuary. Grandma’s sanctuary was about eight by ten. It was my first time inside. The smell of incense, burnt cigar, yerba buena, and mango candles gave the room a warm feeling. The first thing I noticed upon entering was an altar with Saints streaming from one end of the table to the next. There were so many saints that I couldn’t help but wonder if they were all really God’s angels. I recognized some of them. They were the ones An Invisible Decade Page 5 most Catholic households had at the entrance of their doors or hanging from the mirror inside their cars; San Miguel, San Epedito, and Santa Clara. I noticed San Gregorio Hernandez, the doctor who had been a teacher to me since I was five years old. He once told me to learn the value of silence because words were dangerous. I always felt protected because I knew that somewhere out there he was watching over me. I never told anyone about him because he only visited in my dreams. As I continued to navigate the room with my eyes, I noticed the little papers underneath the bronze statues; the notebooks filled with random scribbles; the white, red, yellow, and black candles on the altar and on the floor. I remember noticing that the flame on the black candles danced from left to right instead of upwards like the other ones. To the left were two white rocking chairs and in between them an Indian statue with a bronze plate at its feet filled with water and coins. I didn’t like Indians very much, because an Indian had tried to drown me when I was nine years old. My family had planned a field trip to the Ballacane River a hot summer day in July. I loved the loud drums and rhythmic guitar of Spanish music; the soft bread and freshly seasoned chicken; and the room temperature water in the river. I didn’t know how to swim but had decided to learn that day. I wanted to jump off the four-story rock that rose powerfully from the river. Little kids no older than six years old who were raised in that neighborhood jumped head in and landed victoriously as they swam from one end of the river to the other. Grandpa showed me how to position my arms and how to move my feet. We practiced swimming that entire morning. The distance was only 40 feet or so. I must have gone back and forward a few times with Grandpa by my side. After lunch, Grandpa was floating in the middle of the river, in front of the mysterious rock. I began to swim towards him but as I reached him I An Invisible Decade Page 6 felt a hand pull my leg under the water. Before I knew it, the force of the hand began to pull me down and the rock and trees surrounding the river vanished before my eyes.