Network Aztlan Latino Chicano Comunidades Transnacionales

Polaroid of a Young Boy as an Artichoke

by Tomas Rodolpho Gonzales

Click! Here for a Literary Review by Michael Sedano

The bell rang in a strict cadence as pigeons glided past the steeple where they made their nests. Down in the street, people filing towards the church brushed past those now leaving St. Andrew of the Cross. A crowd lingered on the steps as the nine o'clock bunch met the eight. Off to the side the older children were already lined up, girls on one side, boys on the other.

Sister Mary Chrysostom trudged between the lines, hands tightly pressed together under her nose. Occasionally she gestured, with a short pecking of her head, for all to follow her example.

When the bells stopped the crowd parted down the middle, and the children passed up the stairs and into the church. Overhead, the pigeons flapped into the steeple as the crowd poured through the portals, and for a moment, the streets adjacent to St. Andrew grew still.

From around the corner stepped a young boy making his way towards the steeple, towards the cooing, towards the solemnity of the Mass. Hands thrust into gray corduroys, he wore the navy blue sweater and white poplin shirt of his school. His black shoes were scuffed, and the bows of his shoestrings hung down on either side, brushing the walk as he went. Stepping carefully around broken glass, he passed a large willow tree, at the foot of which grew a hundred violet pasqueflowers, and crossed the street in front of the church.

As he approached, he could see the wind flapping a discarded flier against the concrete steps, at the top of which were two great oak doors. They were shut. On each hung a list of names with the separate headings: Banns for Life and Banned for Life. Taking the steps two at a time, the boy did not pause to read. Instead he grabbed a door with both hands and managed to open it just enough to squeeze in before it pushed him through and pounded shut.

The dark, waxy smelling vestibule engulfed him in silence. It was a long horizontal corridor, containing three separate entrances into the main hall, each with double swinging doors, each door with a small single window looking in on the service.

As his eyes adjusted to the darkness of the room, the boy slowly walked to the middle set of doors. Rising up on his toes, he peered through a window. The light of the celebration falling full on his face, for an instant, a portrait of the young boy could be seen from within.

The priest stood facing the altar, arms outstretched, thumbs up, an altar boy standing at each side. The boy now stood inside, at the rear of the church. An usher motioned for him to take his place with his classmates at the front. But the boy knelt on the concrete floor, feet against the wall, and when the crowd stood, he stood, and when they sat, he leaned on his haunches, and when the bells rang from the altar, he knelt again, feet against the wall.

And when his kneecaps began to ache, his mind began to wander and he imagined himself kneeling on the softness of the padded pew in the last row, just beyond his reach. Seeking distraction from the hard, cold concrete, the boy glanced at a woman, too old to kneel, sitting with her eyes shut, fingering her beads with twisted hands as she feverishly gummed her tongue. His mind now wandered to the time he saw the usher sneak money from the collection box.

The boy had been up in the choir, and turned around to see the usher quickly stuffing notes into his pocket as he walked down the stairs to the vestibule. The boy had been scandalized, and had rushed to the priest and told him what he saw. But the priest pulled his ears and punished him for lying. He remembered the usher had put his hand on his shoulder and pleaded with the priest not to be too hard on him, and the priest had said he had to be because the boy was smart, and that was dangerous, and these thoughts raced through his head and his knees and his mind were becoming quite numb and he saw a long black skirt which shaded a pair of black boots that pointed directly at him and he looked down at the floor and presently the black pointedness was thrust into view and he followed the skirt up past a string of rosary beads to a white habit which circled flushed cheeks in front of which were thrust two hands tightly pressed under a nose. It pecked at him several times. He understood. He was to get to his feet and accompany it to the front pews. Late again, you must be taught a lesson!

The boy glanced to the side, and there, looking a bit disconcerted, stood the usher. He got to his feet and shook his legs and rubbed his knees hard. Already the crowd was beginning to stir in his direction. He followed the nun as she made her way up the center aisle amid the multiplying stares of the throng.

Slowly, he made his way behind the nun, behind the clicking of black heels that mingled with the clanking of black beads echoing in the chamber of this great hall and sinking into an abyss of silence. Slowly, the boy made his way toward his classmates, who were now turning in his direction.

The priest, who had begun the three prayers, paused, turned around red faced, and dug into the boy unmitigatedly. He now felt every eye riveted on him, every eyebrow arched, shrouding him, hovering above him, in a black furry halo of outrage that gripped him by the collar and thrust him to the center of the sacrifice. He bowed his head as he walked past the rows of the multitude, past the flock, past the searing sockets of disdain that scrutinized his every flinch, until at last he came to those harbingers of his distress that once more usurped his territory, and once more he followed the skirt up to the habit, which now seemed gray, and once more he saw the hands that rose and formed a steeple over which perched that impermeable nose.

They stood at the front of the church, the nun facing the boy, his hands folded at his chest. His eyes to the floor, he patiently awaited the signal that would dismiss him into the row of fidgeting boys seated to his left. For the briefest moment the nun's lips appeared from behind colonnades of white marble-like fingers, then quickly retreated into a purse. Viewing this simper as a favorable sign, the boy thought to return her apparent kindness, in larger measure, when the nun pecked at the girl seated to his right, causing the entire row to move over one space in unison. Disconcerted, the boy searched the faces of his classmates for some element of succor, but all were turned away. Sheepishly, he stepped into the no mans land of the barren seat, but as he stepped, he stumbled on his rabbit ear shoelaces. He landed with a slap of his hands against concrete, but managed to keep his feet flat on the floor. He was now hobbling in front of the nun on all fours. Quickly, he leaned back on his haunches, crossed himself, and popped into the pew, loosening a hymnbook from the bench as he went. It tumbled into the aisle. He bent down to pick it up with his right hand and gave it to the girl seated at his side. She grabbed it from him and slammed it into her lap, as the nun genuflected and took a seat with the boys.

The priest, having observed the boys' curious feat with contempt, jerked around to face the front of the church, cleaned the sweat from his brow with his right hand, wiped it on his vestment, adjusted his maniple, and signaled the altar boy on his right for resumption of the service. The bells rang and the organist struck up a devotional hymn as the flock undulated to its collective knees, rolling from front to rear. All in the service were drawn down except the boy and the old woman. Again the bells exhorted the faithful to their knees, and again the boy sat motionless, eyes closed in seeming contemplation, the woman patiently strangling her beads.

The organ let out a threnody, and died on a grating note, the dissonance fanning the fires of silent antagonism that now engulfed the entire edifice. Once again all eyes fell on the boy. He sat, like a statue carved in a curvature of apprehension, like a perfectly balanced structure upon which a misanthrope fly might dally and cause to crash to the floor, like a condemned criminal awaiting a volley of bullets. As he sat close-eyed, he could distinguish clearly the flickering of candles.

At the front of the church, on either side of the altar, were two very large metal stands, each containing many rows of candles arranged in a step-like symmetry. Some of the candles were unused, and hence, unlit. But the majority were at different stages of luminosity; some newly lit, some halfway burned, still others agonizing in that last flicker of flame. Listening, the boy pictured that last agony.

For the first few seconds a new candle burns freely as the flame stretches to its furthest height. In the next seconds the flame settles into the wax that forms at the center, where it remains, silently feeding. Inevitably, the time comes when there is no longer sufficient fuel, and the flame begins to grow dim, and the candle, forced to conserve energy, begins to flicker. After a time, the flame appears to die, and in the next instant it jumps to life again, seeming to burn at its most brilliant, and then flicks off and then pulls the air in on itself and causes the bubble bursting sound that now caught the boys attention. When the flame is finally done, a fine line of smoke momentarily spirals and stretches, and then is gone. In his minds eye the boy now followed the fine smoke twisting and turning up into the cold, empty rafters.

The slap sent the boy headlong into the railing at the front of the pew. His hands had been folded in his lap, and the force of the blow to the back of his head caused him to strike the rail and to tear a gash over his eye, as he continued on to the floor. He pushed himself up into a kneeling position, palms to the ceiling, catching the first drops of blood. The nun now stood over him, watching as the girl repeatedly swung the hymnbook, striking him on his head. The priest attempted to vault the communion railing but was restrained by the altar boys. The lone sound was now the thud of the book as the boy was pulled and pushed into the aisle by the nun. Trying to protect himself from the blows he was receiving, the boy curled on the floor, knees pulled up to his chest, and hands over face. He felt the thud of the book and the black boots, toes pointed, tear into him. The aerobics of thud and thump were all that echoed through the vast enclosure as the girl and the nun pummeled the boy unmercifully, until they were utterly exhausted, until their clothes clung to their bodies, until their sweat mingled with the blood and urine of the boy. And still they continued to swing and to trample him, popping the buttons from his sweater and shirt, seizing him by the hair and rocking his head into the concrete of the cold wet floor to the litany of whap slap thud, whap slap thud. They were now totally spent and hunched over each other gasping for air. The priest, who had freed himself, arrived and assisted them to their seats.

The boy lay prostrate, feet to the altar. Spent, he slowly turned and pulled his tattered body up to the communion rail. The altar boys bent over him, cleansing the gash that had been opened above his eye. The heavy breathing of the combatants dissipated, and once again everything and everyone grew still. Now the crowd stood as one, looking at the boy.

And then, like the crackling of candles in the distance, like a titter of uneasiness creaking from afar, like the distant steps of a drunken mob slamming into walls as it makes its way up the corridor, pounding and pushing until it bursts into the hall in a cacophony of hoots and guffaws and unruliness, shaking the building to its foundation as it comes ever closer, the congregation erupted into bellicose uncontrollable laughter. They laughed and rolled in the aisles. They held their bellies, and laughed until tears ran down their cheeks. They slapped one another on their backs and shouted, "For the love of god, I can't take anymore."

And when this had gone on for a time, the boy rose and faced the mob, which was now behaving like delirious tree men, mounting the railings and jumping from pew to pew.

The boy made his way through the uproar, past the execrations of the priest, past the taunting of the multitude, past the pew where the old woman had been seated, and which now contained only a handful of beads. He walked through the water of an overturned stoup and into the vestibule, and squeezed past the heavy doors out onto the steps. He thought he heard the beginning of a hymn for the souls of the faithfully departed, and as he paused to listen, a pigeon lightened itself on him from above. Wiping his head, the boy crossed the street, walked past the willow tree, at the foot of which grew a hundred violet pasqueflowers, and disappeared around the corner.