"Bruce Holland Rogers - Don Ysidro" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rogers Bruce Holland)

wrapped the rest of my body in a shroud and buried it in the churchyard according to the customs of the
Church.

For a time after that, I was in an emptiness, a nowhere place. I didn't see. I didn't hear. I couldn't speak.
I wasn't anywhere, not in my house, not in the coffin in the ground. Nowhere. But that would change.

All my life, I had taught the other people of my village to make pots as I made them. That was nothing
special. We all did this. I made my own don Ysidro pots, except when do├▒a Isabela showed me how to
make her little tiny ones, or don Marcos demonstrated how he painted his. Then for a while, I would
make little tiny pots just like do├▒a Isabela or pots painted in the style of don Marcos. When do├▒a Jen├нfera
had gone to the capital to see the birds and animals on ancient pots, she imitated those decorations,
showed us, and soon we all knew how to do it. The rest of the time, I made pots in my own manner,
though sometimes with a little touch of Isabela or Marcos or Jen├нfera that I had learned from them and
made my own.

Now for the week after I had died, everyone in the village would be making pots as I had made them.
Even the children, if they were old enough to make pots of their own. They dug white clay from my
favorite place, soaked it, filtered it, let it settle, and poured off the clear water from the slurry. When the
clay was dry enough, they mixed in the ashes of my hands. Then they made clay tortillas and pressed
them into big plaster molds for the base, just like the ones I used. Sometimes they used my very own
molds. They made snakes of clay, attached them to the bases, wound them around from the bottom up.
My pots didn't have necks. Neither did these. The peopleтАФmy family and all the rest of the
townтАФscraped these pots smooth, rubbed them to a shine, and painted them with black paint, using
brushes of my own hair and in designs I would have used: lizards and rabbits with checkered backs, or
else just checkers that started big around the middle of the pot and became intricate at the lip. Those
were pots in the don Ysidro style. They fired them. The ones that the fire didn't break, they brought to
my house. Susana put pots all around the front room, and even in the bed where I had lain.

But I didn't see this. I only knew it was happening.

These pots in my house sat undisturbed. The people burned the brushes made from my hair.

On the third day, there was a feast at my house. Probably there were all kinds of tamales, some with
olives and meat, some with seeds and beans. Men and women drank pulque, and there was perhaps
melon water for the children. The sun went down. Candles were lit. A fire burned in my fireplace.

At midnight, don Leandro opened a box and took out the mask made of my own skin. He put my face
over his face, and I opened our eyes. I came from the place that was nowhere. I was in the room. I
looked at the faces, at the wide eyes of the living, at Susana holding her hand over her mouth. I saw my
grandchildren, Carlos and Jalea, Ana and Quinito. And for the first time, I could see the pots in the living
room. They glowed in the candlelight. Together, don Leandro and I went into the bedroom and I saw the
pots there on the bed. We returned to the living room, and I said with our mouth, тАЬI see that I am not
dead after all!"

тАЬNo, no, don Ysidro,тАЭ they assured me. тАЬYou are not dead!"

I laughed. That's what you feel like doing when you see that you aren't dead.

Then don Leandro threw the mask into the fire, and I wasn't in the mask any more. I was in the pots. In
all those round pots made by the hands of my friends, my rivals, my family, my neighbors. I was there, in