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