Good Friday at Old Pascua

Deer dancer ties on moth cacoons to his calves, ties on antlers, swirls rattles
filled with seeds while the Yaqui Marias in flowing gowns glow white as the moon
far from the blonde destroyer who pins on a 14 carat gold American flag
to his Armani lapel, calls out his military to bomb a desert half-way across the globe.
I pull on boots, sweater, my best jeans.  I’d walk on my knees to enter the flower world.
Good Friday and in Old Pascua the procession continues, chapayekas
waving hand painted wood swords at black-coated fareseos, telling the old story
of good chasing evil from the world.  For weeks, the whole village dances days and nights, stamping love’s renewal through the soles of sandaled feet to rhythms
old as moonlight deer nibble in ocotillo, old as betrayal cracking the lips of Judas, old as the fifteen pieces of silver burning his hands, rhythms old as dictators who
believe they are saviors, who smash the vulnerable who pray for peace. 
Deer dancer tilts his head, lifts a foot to the grind of raspados.  His heart taps to the waterdrum’s beat, to the shush, shush, shush of cacoons.  Tonight, deer antlers point our way through terrible thorns of sacrifice to hope’s lush and edible blooms.