Page 181 - Dark Matter:Women Witnessing Issue #3 - December 2015

Dark Matter: Women Witnessing - December, 2015 Issue #3 - EXTINCTION / DEVOTION

The Bone in My Yard:

Offering, Devotion, and a Story-Carrier’s Tale

by Rebecca Brams

I buried the bone in my backyard, under the Japanese maple tree, as Puma told me to. I would have

thought the offering should be left in the wilderness, in the high places, close to the mountain gods. But

no, under this tree in our tiny yard, the dense weave of city life just beyond the fence. When I listened, I

heard: that was what Puma wanted.

Thirteen years before, I was given an unexpected gift that set me on the path of the story-carrier. It all

started at Raqchi, an Inca site in the Peruvian highlands between Lake Titicaca and Cusco. That was

where Mara found me.

I was 26 years old, a Jewish girl who grew up in a desert presided over by Joshua trees, ravens and

tortoises. I was a traveler passing through the Andes, learning for the first time about this land of

condor, puma and snake. These travels were for me a period of deep listening, opening to a call that

could easily go unheard.

Raqchi. April 2002, autumn south of the equator.

I wander a long grassy aisle in what our tour guide called the women’s quarter. Thick walls rise on

either side of me, each stone fit against the next in a tight embrace. Above the stonework soars smooth

adobe. Doorways lead into identical roofless rooms. I pause at the entrance to one. A little breeze

sweeps through, touching my hair, bringing with it the smell of crushed grass. I look around. My

boyfriend Mikhail is nowhere in sight.

I step through the doorway. Inside, the air is quiet and still, sheltered by all that rock. There are three

trapezoidal niches set into the wall. I sit in the corner near them. The stone wall at my back is

surprisingly warm, still holding heat from the afternoon sun. I rest against it; my eyes close.

My fingers weave down into the thick pad of grass. Fingertips graze something hard. I work my hand

around it, the smooth oval shape of a pebble revealed. I draw the stone to the surface. It fits perfectly in

the hollow of my palm.

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