Sunday Mass (Day 3)

[Thee Independent]

--> From The Nights Intentions Overrule Freedoms

Muse

The place is simple and used, but it suffices. The walls are clean, the carpet thin, but vacuumed, and the chairs are all set for the guests that Capa seeks every Wednesday evening to lead towards his own vision of enlightenment.

Capa

The lights are low in the sparsely lived in room. A lone figure sits at an old metal foldout table, siting on a rusting metal chair. He sits with a candle lit and has a bottle of Bacardi accompanied by a shot-glass next to the candle. He seems intent on his meal of rice, and beans in sauce. The Vienna sausages still sit in their can, the one from the middle is missing. Once he is done he pours a shot and downs it in one motion.

He clears his plate into the trash, in the kitchen, and then washes the plate and fork. Again Candles light this room. He does a few more things in here and when finished he goes into the other room.

Here he lights a cone incense and places it in an urn. The urn is made of what appears to be rose colored marble but it could just be the candle light. Behind the urn is a statue of a Saint. He strips naked and places something in his mouth, chewing slowly. Siting on his knees he bows his head, a mumbling chant can be heard coming from him. A glint of a knife flashes as Capa picks it up , with a quick slash he opens a wound in his right palm. Holding out his arm stretched out in front of him he allows the blood to hit the ground and soak a bead necklace.

Once a minute passes Capa reaches down and picks up a necklace from were the blood had spilt. “Saint Anthony I offer you this as a vehicle for you to manifest.” He sits for what seemed to be hours. The blood dries onto the beaded necklace. Capa slowly and reverently puts it over his head and on his neck.

TI

The saints are like the stars.

Capa's hearty lunch tides him over for the duration of his ceremony, letting the afternoon sun sink below the Pacific horizon as a cloud of incense spreads through his $555-a-home. He is alone, save for the unnatural echo of his calls through the ages, rebounding back to him from as far away as the stars coming out in the night sky. They twinkle and they watch in reverence.

In his providence Christ conceals them in a hidden place that they may not shine before others when they might wish to do so.

Returning the reverence, Capa bares all in a show of humility, placing the proverbial wafer of humble pie on the tip of his tongue. As he chews, the feels hubris melt away, stripped from him as the flesh from a peach between a starving man's teeth. A fulfilling feeling invades his naked body. The monotony is disappearing, and the silver heartstrings are manifesting, feeding him with the starving man's sustenance.

The candles flicker, their halos bulging after two hours, swollen with Capa's presence. And all at once, he has taken too much, been too willing to hear, and not to speak, to eager to have and not to give. Slowly, like a repentant glutton leaving the dinner table, Capa places the knife's blade against his palm.

Yet they are always ready to exchange the quiet of contemplation for the works of mercy as soon as they perceive in their heart the invitation of Christ.

Saint Anthony has given his consent. The Evangelical Doctor has administered the divine panacea to dissolve this domain's spiritual blockage. The hard impurities are washed away, clumped together by the clinging incense, and whisked through the cracks in the walls, beneath the door and even through the closed windows. Heaven is closer than ever before, the stars above growing brighter by the minute. Capa bleeds his gathered excesses away, giving back to Anthony of Padua what He has provided, consecrating the beads with every drop of life-giving fluid, dedicating them to the Liberator of Prisoners, the Guide of Pilgrims, and the Performer of Miracles.

“Saint Anthony I offer you this as a vehicle for you to manifest.”

Legend has it that even the fish loved to listen.

Like fish to water, Capa's congregation would be arriving soon, their injured hearts eager to receive Saint Anthony's consoling words.

And now, after Capa's long ritual, this $555-a-month Sanctuary is willing to let His powerful words come through.

Capa

'Pata-ka'
The sound of the Bata echoes in the room. For now its only lit by candles. A group of people sits in the near darkness. All gathered around a semicircle facing a shrine dedicated to St. Anthony and Saint John. Over fifty candles burn at it, their light illuminates the room casting moving shadows on those gathered. Inside the semicircle sits the Bata player and a Guitarist. Two women also sit within the circle wearing white dresses and red sashes, which are tide around their waist.

A crucifix hangs on the wall behind the shrine the flames make the shadow dance around it. Murmurs of prayer echo in the room as the Bata plays.
Pump-pataka-pump-pata-pata-pata-pata-pata-pap

From an open doorway, a voice speaks in Spanish.
"San Antonio, we call you to bring us closer to the Lord, bless us with your presence. Ancestros, we call you to share your wisdom with us, bless us with your presence."

From the opening steps Capa, dressed in white pants and a white shirt. A necklace with beads adorns his neck accompanied by a string of rosary beads and a longer necklace with a small figurine tied to it. He walks by those congregated and comes to the semicircle kneeling in front of the Shrine.

A light flickers and then a sweet aroma fills the room as Capa lights cone incense and places them with in urns on the shrine. He turns and walks to the center. The two women stand and begin to dance around him. The congregation stands at their seats and joins in the song with tambourines, guicharos, and their hands. The African rhythm of the song begins to quicken. As the two dancers begin their revolutions around him, Capa seems to be over taken by force and starts to spin in ecstasy. His body does not seem to be under his control as he whirls and thrashes.

Service goes as it usually does. After the call to the Saints and Ancestors everyone joins in songs of praise. For the sermon, Capa, speaking in a different tone and pitch, delivers a story brought to him by ancestors, this one is a about living gracefully and enjoying life to the fullest. Everyone gathered know that he is being ridden by Ernesto. “…and Ernesto came to the world, born a slave… Life was hard but he gave praise to the saints and called on his ancestors, thanking them for the blessing of life...”. His sermon goes out in Spanish and there is someone of in a corner quickly translating to English for those that may not understand him. The next part is always his favorite because he calls for those that need prayer and also those that would like to testify and giving thanks to the Saints and Ancestors.

“Now if there is any one here who needs prayer or would like to testify please rise and share with us.” He stands waiting for anyone who would like to speak. If they do he sits at his seat in the front row and listens.

Judy Campbell

Wringing her hands, Judy Campbell rises from one pocket of the congregation. Modest pearl earrings dangle over her shoulders. They glisten in the firelight, adorned with a sheen that makes them seem freshly plucked from the seabed, from out of the clam's very mouth.

"Well," she starts hesitantly, as she often does when something is on her mind, "I just wanted to say that I have something to be happy for." She addresses the congregation with forced boldness. To her, this collection of Santeria followers are a less clinical therapy group, people who have heard her weekly woes with open minds (with a few questionable murmurings, which always go largely ignored by an imperious tilt of her nose.)

"I met someone this week. His name is Frederick Aines. He's a merchant banker from San Antonio - very good dresser, excellent commissions from his banking firm, some beautiful property here in L.A., and, I'm almost chagrin to say, but a great kisser, as well - and while he's only here in town for another week, I really think that he could be the One," she lifts her eyelids emphatically. Capa might recall the inflection. Her last husband was the One, as well.

"What you said inspired me." Judy now wraps her hands precariously in front of her diaphragm. "Just like you said about Ernest, how he was a slave but he found reason to praise the saints?" She smiles, the years having been kind to a semi-lustrous smile. "Well, so do I. For Rick, I guess," she shortens his full name to the rousing post-copulatory nick. "Paying off the settlement debts from my last divorce has made me, well, a slave, kind of like Ernest. Why, just last week, I was balancing my monthly badget. Yes," she haws, rolling her eyes up in exasperation, "I have to do that now myself. Anyway, I realized that I'm only making about $4,900 a month now, after expenses! Can you believe it? I completely empathize with Ernest..."

"But now that I have Rick, I have a reason to be happy again. Thank the Saints for moving him into my life."

Her piece said, Judy Campbell resumes her seated position, her cheeks flushed with a mixture of excitement and anxiety.

Mort Epstein

Mort slides his chair over with a rumbling shudder that shakes him down to his gut. He loved the feeling. It made him think of all those butterflies drowning in his stomach acids.

Rick, from San Antonio.

The Last of the Great Postmodern Writers dobs his ball-point pen on the page of his notebook. He carries it with him to every service, and also to every restaurant, party, hotel, public restroom, and private residence he went. Semper Paratus, he might say, had he ever fallen so low in his lofty artistic void as to join the Coast Guard. All of the other services were by far too active for his tastes. If only he could say the same for his prized notebook, which, on the first few pages, has more glaring scratch-outs than rich, meaningful, witty, or inspiring text.

Six to eight weeks, I give them. And that's being generous.

He smiled peevishly at his handiwork. If only he had the gall to say it to Judy Campbell, one of L.A.'s most despicable gold diggers.

Capa

Thank you Judy the saints are glad that you are well, and have such a beautiful life to share with us. Is there any one else who would like to share?

A tense 15 seconds go by and no one rises. Then a figure stands in the back row. "I do not want to ask to much of the saints for my life is also well. I do wish to ask for prayer for my brother." A woman speaks Her voice trembles with nervousness. Its Yolanda she has been attending the services for a while but has never participated since her initiation.

"He has been diagnosed with HIV just last Friday. I would like to ask for prayer to the Saints to intervene and make his suffering less. Thank you." She begins to sit down but is stopped by Capa.

"Please come forward and we will send a prayer out to him. Capa waves her forward and she moves to the center of the semicircle.

"I alguien mas que nesesite oracion hoy? Any others who need prayer today?"

Sid Berkowitz

Sid Berkowitz knows the fear in Yolanda's voice, and yet, he does not. The timorous vibrato in her testimony comes from a source too close to her for him to completely empathize. Her brother has contracted HIV, probably through immodest dalliances, and the sickness is as much a death sentence as old age. In that respect, Sid Berkowitz can empathize. He can muster a solemn yet stoic bow of his head, one that obscures his chin beneath the weight of drooping jowls. His heart begins to pound, elevating his blood pressure a notch, but such is the price for emotional involvement with his fellow man. Sid has come to know his body so well over the past decade that barely a bout of tachycardia gets by him without his notice.

But unlike Yolanda, he has no memories of her brother. She stares glassy-eyed at Capa, and Sid can imagine what she is seeing: smiles from childhood, stolen cookies, swing sets, church socials, the masculine arrogance of young adulthood, first kisses, first romances, first deaths and tragedies shared together. Only the two of them, standing hip to hip against the world. Even when they parted ways to pursue their own lives, their memories of one another connected them, as though they were still walking hand-in-hand.

Now he has stumbled, and she finds herself falling to the dirt with him when she had been so sure of her step in life. She cannot stop thinking about him, about his potenitally imminent death. Sid does not even know the man's name. He feels for her, he truly does, but his compassion does her no justice.

Sid Berkowitz has no family to bring him down, no children or grandchildren to fall ill, to marry, to celebrate or console. His loneliness is no cause for tears, though, for without a family, there is no one to be dragged down by his own approaching demise.

Bless the Saints for that. They have guided his life to ensure he brings heartache to no one. To no one, that is, but himself, sitting here quiet and contemplative, stroking a silver Star of David with his right thumb. It chaffes, speckling his woolen pant leg with flecks of dead skin.

Capa

No others come forth today for prayer, Capa begins.

"San Antonio take this message and deliver it to those beyond. We thank you San Martin Caballero for the blessings and good fortunes that you bring to our life. Mira la vida de Judy Campbell and bring her good fortune help to guide her in making the correct choices in her life so that she may live happily. San Juan we thank you for the blessing of health that you bring to us in the name of the Father Look unto us and minister your medicine so that none shall suffer unnecessarily, and now I ask you to look to the life of Yolanda's brother he is beset by what many call an incurable disease I ask you to ease his suffering in this trying time of his life. Work trough her love for him to bring him peace in this time. We thank you oh heavenly angels, look after us children... " Capa finishes the prayer and turns Yolanda.

Bringing her to the shrine, he hands her a lit candle and shows her which one to light for her brother. It's a large red one, the color of fresh blood, inside of a glass tube. They complete the ceremony by having her light the candle for her brother.

Mort Epstein

Mort stands in reverence during Capa's prayer. An itch creeps up the back of his left leg, brought on by the smoke or the dancing or his sometimes ill-timed chronic sweat-outs. The thought of a tiny trickle of perspiration climbing down his leg like the melting white candle wax irritated him. He lifts his right leg quietly, making sure to scratch his calf without clumsily bumping his seat and making it squeal across the floor.

A stolen glance about the congregation proves to Mort that his privacy has not been compromised. All eyes (those not closed in prayer along with Capa, closed because that's how the Christians do it, closed because it seems to be the right thing to do, even though the Saints never turn their eyes from us if Capa is to be believed) are on the front, on the crimson candle encased in glass like the Beast's enchanted rose. Their Santeria Priest wields the candle with all the wonderment of a religious artifact, capable of miracles.

Oh, yes. Yolanda's brother will probably be miraculously cured of AIDS when it melts down to a bloody puddle of wax and blackened wick. The allure of gothic fiction, for all of its diabolically convenient plot resolutions, just didn't do it for Mort. Not anymore. Not since he had become a sophisticated author. Now, he could debunk the genres he used to write if he wanted to, an act that reminded him, with every snide, self-degrading comment, just how far he had come. And sometime soon, he'll have a published screenplay that can do the same thing and net him something more than minimum wage.

Santerian Nights would be a good title. A scathing drama about the real "latter-day Saints": the modern Ernesto starting off enslaved by the $6.15 an hour tedium, flipping burgers and hoping for something better; Martin the aging pedagogue who has to set his foot in everyone else's life while forgetting about his own; Juan the South American physician who comes to America and realizes that his medical degree doesn't mean anything if it wasn't obtained at an Ivy League school. Yes, that would work out well, in third person omniscient. He could even finish with a crucifixion scene, if he felt he could pull it off without being chincy or cliché.

All he needed was to keep coming here, to keep going through the motions, and the "Saints" would break religious form and become his Muses.

Judy Campbell

The girls wouldn't understand her, not at all. Sally, Jeanine, Hattie and Bobbie (he was gay and single, which essentially made him one of the girls) had already expressed their shock at Judy's brave foray into the occult.

Why, Judy Campbell! Now you're going to religious cults in search of true love? Well, who am I to talk. Divorce does breed desperation. Sally laughed the night before, but Judy knew she was seriously concerned, too. She had to wash down an embarassing show of concern for her "lost lamb" girlfriend with a sip of her Cosmopolitan.

It isn't a fringe cult, Sally. And while the Priest - yes, he's called a Priest, isn't that so intriguing? - is cute, that's just it. He's cute. Young guys are cute, and we're too mature to go for younger men. Besides, I think he's having some financial troubles. There was assent from all around the table. They read between the lines, solemnly. The Priest didn't tithe enough to make a worthwhile love interest.

Pschaw! I'll never be too old for the young boys. If he's that good-looking, Judy, darling, maybe I'll have to find me some new religion! Bobbie is so funny. Just like one of the girls! But he wouldn't be caught dead in this part of town for anything other than a - what does he call it? - a hookup.

"Oh, thank you, Saint Martin Caba-yero," she echoes after Capa, happy to be included in the prayer. Maybe with enough divine intervention, the holy vows might stick this time around.

Capa

Finishing tonight's service Capa makes an invitation to the congregation. " There will be coffee and snacks in the house. Every one is welcome to join us." The music begins to play again Capa exits first followed by the dancers. "I haora vela sobre nosotros, O Santos I Angeles, que nos despedimos por esta noche. Danos las bendiciones que nesecitamos...." (Oh angels and saints watch over us as we leave for tonight. Give us the blessings we need....) Outside, he waits at the entrance to the converted garage which stands about 20 feet form the house. The dancers proceed to the house to help preparing the refreshments.

Outside he waits for people to come out and gives his blessings them as they come out. He says his good byes to those that are heading home and motioning others towards the house for refreshments.

Elvie Straum

Elvie had been silent through the entire service, sacrosanct in her piety. After all, she had much to atone for. Years of Catholic fervor had instilled trained reverence into her, which carried over into her dutiful attention in Capa’s services now. The fact that the Church had failed her has not marred her ability to belief. They were just a corrupt group of moneygrubbers, those ones. How could she have anticipated that they would not help her in her time of need, when she was losing her home, her husband, and all of her credit cards? Would it have killed them to give back a marginal amount of the money that she had donated since adolescence?

No, she was ripe for something new. Elvie was alone in her advanced years when she first began attending these meetings, and at the time she was not on a respirator either. She had stood out as much as every other member of the congregation tends to, being so small. She had warned Capa, “I’m just trying something new. I need something to follow, you know?” The Priest had been understanding and compassionate, not even seeming to notice her permed ball of blue-gray hair, fluffed deliberately to catch the eye and keep it from staying on the folds of wrinkles that tugged her face down towards her drooping chest. He had not judged her by her tight, hospital uniform patterned clothes that she wore just for color, refusing to fall in with the rest of the elderly and their drab browns and pinks. She could tell that he would not judge her so she gave this Santeria a try.

Now she has been attending for almost a year and she is devout, never missing a service. She has found a nee niche for her silent redemption and she is even beginning to believe in these Saints. It is not a far stretch for her, from the Christianity that she already knew so well, and it can be very easy to trust in Capa when he is enraptured in his madness. She likes to think that she is closer to God somehow through this man than she ever was at the outstretched fingers of the Catholic wanna-be’s. Still, her form of worshipping is the quiet and attentive path, not because she does not have the gumption to join in, but because her fervency speaks for itself. Capa sees it, she knows. And he never presses her to stand and come forward. He knows she is there, though. Especially now, from the steady hissing and sucking of the backpacked machine that makes it possible for her to still be there.

As a matter of fact, his quiet faith in her has made the elderly lady so comfortable that she confided in him about her problems. Just, not in front of the congregation. She did not need their judgment. She can not help the fact that she fees obligated to win back the money, her life, that she stupidly lost before. She will get it back again - she has to. And the man that lets her try, he is nice and respectful and he was interested in hearing about her problems too. And even he agreed that the gambling is not the crisis. He understood, and so did Capa, in his own way. Her Priest was worried for his own reasons, but he did not condemn her or command her to cease trying.

And for his loyalty to her, she offers her own. She attends every Wednesday night and even comes to his group meetings, seeking her forgiveness before she sets out to her other secret place to win back her salvation. On this night, Elvie is one of the first people to leave, walking slowly, but proudly. She stops to give Capa a grandmotherly hug and asks him to call her cab and then she moves on to the house. No reason to pass on the coffee. She will need it tonight to help her stay awake. It seems like she never gets to bed before midnight anymore. She sees Sid ahead of her and catches up. At least they have their years in common, if little else.

Capa

Capa heads to the house as the last of his congregation exits the garage. Entering with a smile on his face “S’the coffee good? It’s got juju juice in it.” He waits for the obvious Question of “What’s juju juice?” He then holds his neck as if he was choking “Yu, Yu just drank LA water” Smirking he grabs a white styrofoam cup and pours himself a cup and begins drinking it.

Sid Berkowitz

Sid steps heavily to the side of the coffee table, which is really just a kitchen tray with wobbly pastel green legs. He nods to Elvie, making room for her.
"Two creams, three sugars," he whispers with a gentle smile, though he did not like the thinness in his voice. "Let me, Elvie."

He fills a styrofoam coffee cup with decaf, then starts to peel back the lid on a container of artificial creamer. Capa's "juju juice" gets a throaty little laugh.

"Good service tonight," he offers small talk to Elvie and Capa, giving the meeting a familiar feel for Elvie, like those tiny conversations outside after Sunday Mass. "It is nice to see Ms. Campbell finally settling down with a good man."

His hand shakes as he pours the creamer in agitated dollops. Th elderly, in all their wisdom and experience, did not have to focus cynically on the more probable truth: that Judy Campbell is doomed to another failed marriage because her heart isn't in the right place. They also did not have to mention Yolanda's dying brother. Death already played a large enough part in their lives.

Sid and Elvie do not have to say these things because they have seen them so many times before. It is not new. And yet, they were here, in the twilight of their lives, to find something novel, something real that was also good.

Capa

“Thanks Mr. Berkowitz. And yes I hope that Ms. Campbell is able to find what she is searching for with this one.” Capa looks sideways at Sid and Elvie “How have you two been. I hope everything is well.

Capa continues the small talk and makes his way around the room. Looking to see if Mort and Judy are in the room to say hello to them.

[Thee Independent]

Elvie Straum

Elvie offers a thick smile at Capa's joke and adds with an off-handed jab at death that only the elderly and the condemned are allowed, "The water hasn't killed me yet, and if it were to now, it might be a blessing." She gratefully takes the coffee from Sid, nodding and mmm hmmming in agreement about Judy. "Everybody has a right to make themselves happy."

She turns back to face Capa and lifts her oxygen mask to her mouth for a moment of assistance before putting it back in her hip bag and sipping loudly on her drink. She refuses to wear the lines to her nose, even though her doctor recommends it. She is not that old! She is only seventy eight, afterall. "Everything is fine, Dear. Don't you concern yourself with us when you've got so many others that need you more," she chides, not even giving Sid the chance to answer. Then again, this will probably not inhibit him anyway. The way the two of them talk and bumble over one another's sentences, you'd think they were married. As a matter of fact, they very well might be if it were not for some very practical differences in their personal theologies. Elvie, for one, would not marry again at this age. That would just be nonsense!

Sid Berkowitz

"Doing well. As well as can be expected," Sid answers Capa, pouring himself some coffee. He does not give the artifical sweetener or creamers a second glance. The coffee could not possibly be as bitter as the news he received this afternoon. He swallows his feelings with a hot mouthful of coffee.

Judy is goyim, and a real nochshlepper in matrimony to boot, but she is also a beautiful young woman - no meshugeneh here - and thus deserved all the fortune in the world to find her happiness. She was still young. She could still have it.

"Mazel tov," Sid murmurs between noisy sips, sharing his feelings on Ms. Campbell after Elvie.

Mort Epstein

Greenhouse gossip suggests that music can help a houseplant grow, that a unique attention to the environment gives domesticated flora a positive response to Schubert's mystical German ballads or Wagner's sweeping, energetic passages of raw, fierce power. A social bouquet blooms around Mort Epstein. Their soft spines bend against his breezy words.

"So I thought, why not make ends meet? Isn't the struggle for a higher credit card limit part of the American Dream, too? Some friend of a friend of a roommate's agent got me a bartending job at some after-hours shindig uptown; one of Universal's overdone romantic-slash-situation-comedy flicks reached the wrap in six or eight weeks or however long it takes them to recycle garbage these days. Anyway, some guy, a caterer waiting for the film extras to finish up a massive tray of cold cuts, comes and sits down and orders a martini. I mix it up for him, and in minutes, the guy's bawling to me about how his life sucks, how his girlfriend's got the Hollywood bug and wants to get into acting and quit her job working for great tips at the Planet yadda yadda I'm a normal schmuck down on his luck et cetera et cetera the lifeless prole cutting up gouda and cotto salami for the bourgeoisie. I think, where's the schlock playwright looking for a metarealistic monologue, or the latest daytime TV talk show host - Tony Danza, I think - to pick up a sob story to keep his slack-jawed audience entertained for twenty minutes? Then I realize...hey, that's me."

The petals flap in mute laughter. Legs, rooted to the tiled floor, begin shifting back and forth in search of fresher nutrients.

"But," Mort emphasizes, hedging the garden with a sweep of his arm, "before I can work the sucker over, someone else comes and sits at the bar next to him and orders a beer. Then, totally ignorant of his neighbor's plight, he gets saucy and tells me about how the director offered him an assistant producer tag in the credits - a real sign of low station, if you didn't know - and how his wife just spent ten thousand dollars on a new patio set and how he was planning on using the money for a pool room in the carport, now renovated into a clubhouse, and he keeps drinking his beer and spilling his greedy guts all over the counter, bitching and moaning about the most trivial bullshit. And the whole time, the caterer's sitting there getting smaller and smaller. By the time the Hollywood bastard left, I thought for sure the guy would throw himself out the paneled mirror across the room - it did have a great view of West Vine - but he just started digging out some meager tips and paying for his drink."

Here it comes, the coup de grace. Mort cannot fail now! The storyteller has hypnotized them with his swirling, critical eye, and melted their feet to the floor with an acidic wit. They even seem physically pained to be held in suspense for the climax of his anecdotal social commentary.

"Then I pounted out - just to make the guy feel a little better - that he ordered the martini, and the assistant producer got a beer. Bottled, even, not tap."

Heh heh, the daffodil in a yellow dress laughed.
Hee hee, whispered the slim vine of a man winding his arm around the daffodil.
Oooooh...hah, quoth the meek forget-me-not, who had been distracted by a nearby conversation about bi-partisan politics. That's funny.

"Yes," Mort agreed, but only half-heartedly. He didn't bother telling them that the caterer discovered, grimly, that he did not have the money on hand to pay for the martini, how he made the sap come back an hour later to pay off the dollar he owed. It was a six dollar martini with the most expensive salt ring in the world.

Capa

Capa Excuses himself from Sid and Elvie and goes by to see Mort at his usual antics and smiles as he walks up. At the edge of the gathered group, he asks. "so like a good Christian you paid for his drink form your tips?" giving Mort a wink "You sir are a true Samaritan. So how is the writing coming along?"

Elvie Straum

Elvie finishes her coffee quickly and pats one of Sid's old hands before making her slow way over to Capa and interupting him. It is the right of her age to remain in the spotlight so long as she chooses. She plants a wet, grandmotherly kiss on each of Capa's cheeks, leaving vermillion smears in her wake, and presses a ten dollar bill into his hand. At least these offerings go towards a real cause.

"Goodnight, Dear. I will see you next week!" She sing-songs the end of her message as she walks off, waggling the plump fingers of one wrinkled hand and not giving him the chance to refuse the money.

"Goodnight, Sid. Take care of yourself."

Capa

Capa gives Elvie a kiss and a quick blessing ”Que El Caballero te bendiga, mija. See you Sunday and call me if you need anything, sabes.” She turns before he notices the money in his hand he doesn’t say a word as she leaves the House. Once she leaves he turns back to Mort pocketing the money and silently giving thanks to El Caballero for Elvie's gift.

Mort Epstein

Capa is a true savior. At least to the congregation captured by Mort Epstein's self-gratifying anecdote. They greet the Priest with big smiles and fast, friendly words. Sounds too much like they're cheering, Mort thinks, dourly.

"Yes," Mort lies easily to Capa, preferring the man's moralistic ending to his story. It wasn't realistic, but this was Hollywood, and was the kind of resolution in popular demand. "And no mucho dinero on the writing, senor, but these things take time," he shrugs his shoulders dismissively, before pushing his glasses back up on the rim of his nose.

"There's a lot to write about these days. But there isn't a lot worth writing about."

Sid Berkowitz

"You, too, Elvie. See you next Wednesday." Sid smiles, lifting his unfinished coffee. "Shalom."

Sid sees Elvie to the door, and checks to see that the taxi she had been waiting for has arrived. Every Wednesday, she left in a taxi; she payed the ungodly fare the foreign drivers charged these days, and she was not a woman of any great means.

Sid Berkowitz would write her a check to cover her taxi fare for the next month, if it meant he could continue to be in someone's company who wasn't a generation removed. The woman can be so independant, however, that Sid was afraid he would just hurt her feelings by offering.

Besides, the elderly need to hold on to whatever dignity they can get, and Sid Berkowitz will honor Elvie's dignity, 'lest through shameless acts of kindness he lose his own, as well.

Capa

"Bien dicho Mort, Very well said" Capa gives a quick laugh but his face betrays him for a slight second. A perceptive looker can see sadness etched in his young face. "That is the hollowness inside that we all feel. Una disconectacion, A disconnection to Life. Tu Sabes Mort?"

Capa gets close to him to allow Mort a brief feel to the connection with the Saints. A quick hug, not close enough to allow him to touch the string of black and red beads around Capa's neck, but it may be enough for him to become more curious as to what Capa can offer him. "The offer stands if you want to be initiated to the Regla

Mort Epstein

Sabes. Sabes. To swordfight? You swordfight to the death? Capa, challenging him to a duel? No. To...something. It is a verb!

"Well," Mort stalls, buying time to allow ancient high school Spanish lessons bleed through again, or to hear the grainy crackle of an educational audio tape. All he can remember, though, is the snazzy introduction to the fun and exciting world of bi-lingualism. Every writer should know at least one other language.

Capa outstretches him and makes to hug Mort, who shrinks down but not away. His palms are wide open at Capa's sides, waving slowly, helplessly, not knowing if patting the Priest's back would be too many, or if patting his side would be too queer. Then he remembered. To know!

"Most writers know death at some time or another," he admits, eyeballing the beads dangling from Capa's neck. He whispered something to Mort, but Mort was busy preparing a quote. "That disconnection can be fatal to the craft. And if the craft is the breadwinner, fatal for the writer, too."

Suddenly, what Capa said becomes more important, in collapsing retrospect. "The Regia..." He tried not to make it sound too much like a question by stating it and trailing off. Truth was, he could not remember for the life of him what the Regia were, if in fact he even knew at all.

Checking his notebook to find out would be embarassing, to say the least.

Capa

Capa lets go of the awkward Mort before the whole thing looks ridiculous. “And bread we must all manage to make and if there is a little cheese para el pan, better. Hablamos horita de la Regla, We could talk later about it and I’ll fill you in on what it involves. That way you can make a clear choice. No es pa todos. Sabes? It’s not for everyone, ju know?

Capa goes and makes his rounds thanking people for coming tonight. He shakes so many hands that someone may think that he was running for office. He also looks around to see if Yolanda had stayed after for the coffee.

Mort Epstein

"I'll put the talk on my social calendar. Maybe next Wednesday. Or before then, if you want. I put my phone number down in the guestbook way back when, which I guess you probably still have." Mort checks his watch, but pays no attention to the time. "Anyway, I oughta go. I have to get to this community theatre production of A Long Day's Journey into Night. I'm slated to write a review of it for the paper."

He smirks. "Bread crumbs, you know. Ciao."

Mort Epstein takes a fleeting glance at the elaborate candles. How long did it take him to have everything set up? No more than a half hour, he's sure.

Capa

Capa walks with Mort to the door. "Sure I got it. I'll call you tomorrow Ok. Que San Caballero te cuide.(may Saint Caballero look after you.)" He watches Mort leave and closes the door behind him.

He turns looking for Yolanda, who he needs to speak to about her brother. He is not sure if she came in. With her concern for her brother, Capa wouldn't blame her. As he makes his way back into the living room He stops and speaks to Maria who is refilling the coffeepot for the last time.

"Mira muchacha, have you seen Yolanda I need to talk to her about her brother. O, if you're not occupada I might need your help later con una gallina (with a chicken), if she's here, Ok."

Sid Berkowitz

Sid Berkowitz lingered near the coffee table while many of the congregation continue to leave. His eyes are on Capa, watching him move from one person to the next, consoling the troubled and praising all for having the faith to be amongst the Saints. These words were poignant, coming from a man who claimed to be "ridden" by the ghosts of the holy dead, a word that Sid considered interchangeable with possessed. Whether this was true or not, or even an accurate interpretation of the young Hispanic man's odd terminology, Sid did not know.

All he did know was that the Saints may be a last hope, a last joy for him.

As the last of the congregation begins to depart, Sid does not follow. He instead offers to clean up the coffee table by picking up the sugars and the creamers, clearing them from the table.

Capa

Capa sees the people out and begins to clean up when every one is gone. He takes note of Sid and decides that maybe it’s the time to talk. “Hey Sid I’m glad we are alone. I have been meaning to ask you what a man like yu been doing coming to El Barrio, You seek something that has eluded you everywhere you have sought it? Yu know the Star and all kind of makes me wonder what a man of the tribes of Israel thinks of all of this “sorcery” that we are pegged with.”

Sid Berkowitz

"We have never spoken much about it, you and I," Sid begins, having waited through testimonials and invocations for this conversation. "Because when I asked to join the congregation, there were no questions asked. For that, I am grateful. I would not have known how to answer them, at the time."

Sid Berkowitz puts his hand on Capa's shoulder, leading him on a short walk away from his stewards. A heaviness belabors his pace as he shuffles along, talking. He stops at a screen door looking out towards the garage, their place of worship. "Yes, I am a Jew. Have been since I was a boy. After the War, I felt compelled to join the Orthodoxy. The Tribes and the Torah and the guiding words of an old Rabbi are all I've had to pacify a troubled soul. He said to me, Sidney, you must always do good by the Lord, even when this world's evils - even when Death itself - conspires against you."

Sid shakes his head, surprised to be looking back and judging things he held so sacred. "Oy, but he was old then when I was young. He must have known what it's like to have seen what I've seen. But was he happy? I don't know, I don't know," he rambles, opening his jacket to find something in an inside pocket.

"What I do know is that I'm not. That's why I came. But, I..."

An container in his hand catches his eyes and steals his words away. Capa recognizes the familiar orange plastic and large, child-proof white cap. A white label circles the container, hi-lited in shock yellow and grave red.

"This is why I missed last Wednesday's service. Heart problems. The doctor prescribed these glycerin pills," he changes the subject to something more grounded in reality, but no less difficult to talk about. "He said I have nothing to worry about. At my age, it could be worse, yes?" Forcing a smile never felt more false in his life.

"I take it as a cue, though," he sombers, making eye contact with Capa. Despite their generations of difference, Sid feels that this young foreign man, barely beyond a boy, is unique, as though nothing can touch him. Is that the power of true faith? He knew where those questions would lead. Have I been following the right doctrine? Living for the right God? Is it just fancy that makes me think I can change, at my age? "A cue that I have to look for something new."

"I would like to say that I have found it here, Capa. But I am old, and set in my ways. I have my doubts. Maybe just because I do not fully grasp the power of your Saints. Maybe I do not see them acting so richly for others as you say they do."

But Lord knows, Sid Berkowitz wants to.

Capa

Capa looks concerned "Yes that is dilemma that you are struggling with. I under stand the need for proof but it really is not needed, look around out in plain sight you will see the working of the Saints. Look inside you cause that's were you will find your answer and your purpose do as you feel. Do for yourself and not for others, once you can do for yourself the blessings will flow outwards. If you would like my help in doing this I can give it to you. We can call to the Saints and Angels to find your peace but know that it will come from within you. The Oshira can only show you what is there already nothing new will pop into existence that is just the nature of things.

"You may look to Santeria to show you that there is not need to struggle with your Faith for as I call on the Christian Saints I am also calling on African Gods at the same time. So who is really responding? Can I separate the two? No because they are tied and bound by what I and thousands of others believe.

"So friend would you like to see what you hold inside of you. Are you ready to open up the Angels and Saints that reside within you?"

Sid Berkowitz

"I am." Sid's answer is quick, sharp, and to the point, the kind of accuracy that has become a mark of Jewish heritage. "I can only hope that it is not too late for me. I will listen to your every word, young man. I will try my best to see beyond what I know. But I already feel a cold disposition towards sheer sacrilege."

And an irrhythmic thumping in my chest. Sid blanches before Capa.

"I have watched your ministry for weeks, and might I say something honest? I cannot say one way or the other whether your Saints, your African gods, your spirits and angels are real. You are the one who communes with them, not us. But even if you are a charlatan," he pauses, hoping the word wasn't too strong, "you're a kind and well-meaning one. Nothing but good can come of what you do for these people."

If you aren't leading them astray and damning their souls to Hell, he thinks, solemnly.

"I want to see you continue with this, no matter what. Unless you work against God, and I will not know that until I have gone. But, I do not think so. No, I do not feel so."

Capa

Capa nods at Sid’s response and waits for him to finish. His face is serious but understanding. “I can perform the ceremony now if you would like. But know that once you walk the path of the Saints it is till the end.” Raul motions for Maria to leave them. “I will take care of the rest thanks Maria.”

Maria stops what she is doing. “Ok Capa, see you later.”

“Thank you mija. I’ll Call you. Goodnight!”

“Goodnight!” Maria exits the house and heads home.

Capa looks back to Sid. “Are you ready?”

Capa does not wait for a response form Sid. Going to the kitchen, he comes back with two shot glasses full of a clear liquid. It smells sweat and strong of alcohol. He moves to the center of the living room and places them down on the floor. Going next to the Altar, he lights the center candle the one dedicated to St. Anthony. Then he goes an turns all the lights in the house off. It becomes very quiet in the house now empty of everyone, except for Capa and Sid; the darkness amplifies the stillness. Sid stands where he had been, through all of it. Capa moves through he dark room with rote precision. He lastly brings out the Bata drum out from the corner and places it by the shot glasses.

"Come sit with me" he motions Sid to take the spot on the floor in front of him. This places Sid's back towards the Altar. "Take off your shoes and socks. We need to be bare foot for the ceremony." He then takes out a knife from his pant pockets. Its handle seems to be crafted from bone. Its shape is fluid and continues form the handle through to the copper blade. Standing again he leaves the blade by the drums and shot. He moves to the altar and lights a cone of incense. Returning he takes off his shirt and places it on the couch. He then sits again across form Sid. "Drink now and allow Saint Anthony to open the door for you." Capa takes his drink and takes it down in one swallow. He picks up the knife and brings the blade tip to rest on his palm with a swift flick he opens a cut about an inch long in the center of one palm. The knife switches hands and he does the same to the other palm. Blood begins to drip on the floor boards. Next, he cuts the soles of his feats.

Sid Berkowitz

Sid Berkowitz is given no time to answer Capa, and barely enough time to react to the startling set up of a personal, special ceremony. The old man watches with uneasy interest. He is plunged into darkness with the rest of the house, and solitude creeps in within minutes. But Sid does not have the will to just hold up his hand and leave.

What Capa is doing could change his life forever. And how much more time does he have, really? There's already a bottle of lifesavers in his jacket pocket.

Doing as he is told, Sid slips off his shoes and, arduously, unrolls the dark socks off of his ankles before sitting down with a wheezing grunt across from Capa. "Now wh-" he begins, but is silenced by Capa raising a knife to his own body.

"Wait! Son, wait!"

By the time he has reacted, there are already two cuts in his hands, and two more being marked into the soles of his feet. It is all like some Christian reference to stigmata. Why?

"This isn't necessary, Capa. If you have to hurt yourself for my benefit, let it be. I will come around with time...don't do this to yourself."

Capa

“This is the way to the saints and also how I show my devotion, don't worry I will not loss much blood” Capa begins to hit the Bata. His hands strike the goat hide with power. The Blood begins to paint the drumheads red. “Close your eyes and shed the worries of the world.” A chant begins to stream from Capa’s mouth in beat to the drums. The language has a African sound to it but mingled in it, Spanish names and words can be heard. As he drums the Lone flame brightens behind Sid. Capa drums on in enraptured ecstasy. The shadows begin to move in swirling patterns and the world begins to thin inside of the living room.

Sid Berkowitz

Five minutes of drumming and droning tongues, and Sid Berkowitz is weary. This is nothing like the litanies out of the Torah, or the Hebrew chanting a Rabbi ritualizes before an audience of gray beards and dark cloves. He is out of his element. He knew he would be, but this...it is too much, too fast, and Berkowitz cannot keep up.

"Listen," he starts, leaning towards Capa over the bloody batas. "You've got a lotta chutzpah, trying to do all this for my sake, but I don't feel right about it. I was hoping for something slower. Maybe we could talk, and you could tell me what you know about the faith, about the power. About why you're ministering in Santeria."

Eventually, Sid simply reaches out and puts his shaking hand onto Capa's, silencing the beat.

"Tomorrow, Capa? It is getting late tonight. We can discuss this. I need to understand before...all of this," he pauses, not knowing what to call it. "Otherwise, I'm just not ready for it."

Capa

Sid’s hand falls on Capa’s and reflexively Capa grabs it. He remains sitting until Sid finishes his eyes remain closed. When Sid finishes talking Capa’s eyelids open revealing two white orbs sitting in their sockets. The pupils of the eyes are not visible. From deep within Capa a Hollow voice resounds. “You do not play with the Saints, Sid Berkowitz.” Capa stands, still holding on to Sid’s hand, the motion forces Sid to stand up. Blood runs down Capa’s hands and onto Sid’s. “I am Saint Anthony opener of the ways I have been invoked to divine and call Sid Berkowitz’s Patron.”

Capa/Saint Anthony pulls Sid’s head towards him their lips meet and Capa/Saint Anthony forces Sid’s mouth open with his own. The little saliva that was in the old man’s mouth is sucked into Capa’s. Suddenly Sid is released and Capa stumbles back. Head tipped and mouth open, a vapor escapes his lips.

Sid Berkowitz

"Capa..."

Sid's body quivers in fear. It isn't the young man addressing him anymore. This sorcery - this Santeria - is real. Devilishly real. "Dear God..."

A gasp of surprise quivers out of his lips when Saint Anthony jerks him closer and kisses him. While their lips are touching, Sid Berkowitz squeezes his eyes closed, powerless. The young man's hands are too strong, gripping his head in a stern vice. The old man's fear is also too strong, paralyzing him from the neck down. Even with his eyes closed, Sid Berkowtiz can feel those nova-white orbs burning his eyebrows.

"Oomf!" Sid stumbles backwards when Saint Anthony releases him, collapsing to the mat! The ceremonial drums thrumb dissonantly as he lands upon them, startled and shocked.

His heart begins pounding. Flashes of fire erupt from his left shoulder and from his right hip, where he landed on the batas. Instinctively, his quivering fingers grasp the Star beneath his coat. He removes it and cradles it in his palms until the pointed edges bite into his fingers.

[Thee Independent]

Capa

"Stand Sid Berkowitz for with your essence I Anthony - Elegba mouth piece of Raziel have been called first to find your divine purpose, and secondly as your patron. I am the opener of the ways, the seeker of truths, and the one who brings the gospel to everyone be they poor or rich." If Sid's eyes are opened, he sees the luminescent form of a man standing in front of him. The man holds a book in his hands.

Capa is on his knees, head down on the floor the rhythmic chanting can be heard as he sways form side to side.

Sid Berkowitz

I don't believe this. This cannot be real.

Weak, lying prone upon his back, Sid Berkowitz squints up at what can only be described as an angel summoned to earth to take him away. It is speaking to him. He can hardly make out the words with the blood pumping in his ears. A tingling begins in his left shoulder, as though he, too, were becoming incorporeal.

Saint Anthony speaks of seekings and truths, patrons and purpose, and the poor or rich. The final words ring in Sid, as though they were meant especially for him - do the angels know what is in your bank account?

"Capa?" Sid wimpers, fearful of the awesome power before him, more awesome than any angel he had spirited up in the bylines or plots of a motion picture script. The boy is sitting down, speaking in tongues. He is beyond Sid Berkowitz.

The old Jewish man continues to clutch at the mark of David as though it were Solomon's seal, wielding it close to protect him from this frightful, but amazing being. "Lord Jehovah, hear now my prayer. Let peace come upon me."

Thump. He winces, wondering if the wriggled beat of his heart was a divine answer.
Thump.

Capa

Saint Anthony Speaks "I'm here to show you the way to fulfill your life. Death is the unavoidable but we must strive in this life to better the world around us. Do not fear me for I am neither your judge nor savior but a tool of the Lord. If you accept this sacrament, you will serve as an opener of opportunities and teacher to all. Stand now and embrace me for I am your mate in out spiritual journey. If you decline this sacrament just speak the words and I will be away."

The luminescent being begins to take a sharper form. Its robes are red with black trim. And he has three black rings embroidered on his chest they interconnect forming a triangle.

Sid Berkowitz

Saint Anthony delivers his kind but overwhelming words to a broken old man, who fumbles with one free hand - the one not gripping the tiny Star - in his inner coat pockets. Wrists fluttering with troubled anticipation, he struggles to unlock the childproof lid on a medicinal bottle.

Thumpata. Irrhythmia leaves him feeling off balanced and discomforted.

"I...I need," Sid tries to tell benevolent but frightening apparition, but fumbles the pill bottle. Through tearing eyes, he watches the white glycerin tablets scatter across the floor like miniature wafer cuts, a holy banquet before the Saint.

Thumpatapat!

Bidden, Sid rises, wiping a hand over his eyes. He feels like he is dying, and he does not know what to do, save join hands with the angel who has come to take him away...

Capa

“Stand Curandero, and perform your duties as healer of the sick.” Capa rises from where he sits, looking around he sees that Sid had been fumbling with his heart medication. Leaning over he picks one up and looks at it. Bringing it to his lips he kisses it and then walks to where Sid stands with Saint Anthony. “May Saint John’s blessings of health come to you, Sid Berkowitz.” He holds the pill up to Sid’s mouth in hope that he may yet have a chance to hold Sid to this side of the living. When Sid takes the pill Capa walks to the Bata and sets it back up. Siting down he listens for the rhythm of Sid’s heart and begins to play along with it in hopes of stabilizing it.

Thumpata, Thumpatapat
patapata Thump,
Thump, Thump, Thump, Thump…

Sid Berkowitz

Caught in a fierce spell of dizziness, disorientation, and disbelief, Sid Berkowitz simply closes his eyes and entrusts all to God, to fate, to Capa, or to Saint Anthony. One of them will save him, or ferry him from here to the other side. The bitter glycerin pill sticks to his dry lips before the tip of his tongue laps it inside and swallows harshly.

Sid's fingers close over his heart. He can feel the deep, unsteady pounding of a heart whose electric impulses are no longer steady. We could consider a pacemaker, Mr. Berkowitz, his physician suggested that afternoon. If you like, we can set a date for surgery. I've taken the liberty of contacting your insurance agency, and after reviewing your medical records, they will cover the costs.

He did not give the man an answer. Why?

Thumpata, thumpatapat.
Patapata thump.
Thump, Thump, Thump, Thump...

The old man begins to breathe a little easier, a little deeper, waiting patiently and fretfully for his condition to calm down. The sounds of Capa's drums fill his ears, seeming to lull his pain away. Could it be the healing power of music?

Capa

Saint Anthony Speaks "I'm here to show you the way to fulfill your life. Death is the unavoidable but we must strive in this life to better the world around us. Do not fear me for I am neither your judge nor savior but a tool of the Lord. If you accept this sacrament, you will serve as an opener of opportunities and teacher to all. Stand now and embrace me for I am your mate in out spiritual journey. If you decline this sacrament just speak the words and I will be away."

The luminescent being begins to take a sharper form. Its robes are red with black trim. And he has three black rings embroidered on his chest they interconnect forming a triangle.

Sid Berkowitz

Saint Anthony delivers his kind but overwhelming words to a broken old man, who fumbles with one free hand - the one not gripping the tiny Star - in his inner coat pockets. Wrists fluttering with troubled anticipation, he struggles to unlock the childproof lid on a medicinal bottle.

Thumpata. Irrhythmia leaves him feeling off balanced and discomforted.

"I...I need," Sid tries to tell benevolent but frightening apparition, but fumbles the pill bottle. Through tearing eyes, he watches the white glycerin tablets scatter across the floor like miniature wafer cuts, a holy banquet before the Saint.

Thumpatapat!

Bidden, Sid rises, wiping a hand over his eyes. He feels like he is dying, and he does not know what to do, save join hands with the angel who has come to take him away...

Capa

“Stand Curandero, and perform your duties as healer of the sick.” Capa rises from where he sits, looking around he sees that Sid had been fumbling with his heart medication. Leaning over he picks one up and looks at it. Bringing it to his lips he kisses it and then walks to where Sid stands with Saint Anthony. “May Saint John’s blessings of health come to you, Sid Berkowitz.” He holds the pill up to Sid’s mouth in hope that he may yet have a chance to hold Sid to this side of the living. When Sid takes the pill Capa walks to the Bata and sets it back up. Siting down he listens for the rhythm of Sid’s heart and begins to play along with it in hopes of stabilizing it.

Thumpata, Thumpatapat
patapata Thump,
Thump, Thump, Thump, Thump…

Sid Berkowitz

Caught in a fierce spell of dizziness, disorientation, and disbelief, Sid Berkowitz simply closes his eyes and entrusts all to God, to fate, to Capa, or to Saint Anthony. One of them will save him, or ferry him from here to the other side. The bitter glycerin pill sticks to his dry lips before the tip of his tongue laps it inside and swallows harshly.

Sid's fingers close over his heart. He can feel the deep, unsteady pounding of a heart whose electric impulses are no longer steady. We could consider a pacemaker, Mr. Berkowitz, his physician suggested that afternoon. If you like, we can set a date for surgery. I've taken the liberty of contacting your insurance agency, and after reviewing your medical records, they will cover the costs.

He did not give the man an answer. Why?

Thumpata, thumpatapat.
Patapata thump.
Thump, Thump, Thump, Thump...

The old man begins to breathe a little easier, a little deeper, waiting patiently and fretfully for his condition to calm down. The sounds of Capa's drums fill his ears, seeming to lull his pain away. Could it be the healing power of music?

Capa

"Sid we await your choice do you accept this Sacrament" Saint Anthony speaks again. The drumming continues in the background and chanting can be heard to again coming from Capa. "Take me as your patron and continue your exploration of life while you still have time here on earth. Be an Instrument of the Lord and spread the gospel of the Orisha."

Blood from Capa's wounds is spread around the ritual area. The flesh wounds have stop bleeding but remain open. They will take a few days to heal completely.

Sid Berkowitz

Slowly, Sid opens his eyes - for the first time, it feels, since he threw out his old typewriter. Had he written about this very encounter with a Saint before, gotten the script into some old independent film or privately directed Judeo-Christian home video? Or had he just dreamt about it, hoping that he, Saint Anthony, or one of his celestial kin might come to fill the void, missing all of his life?

But God has granted him lien on life. Sid could be dead now, after his most recent episode. Can he accept this strange apparition as his spiritual patron, tossing out the written teachings of God to follow the mere voice of a ghostly being? Should he?

Capa's blood, shed for Sid Berkowitz, glistens all around him. Drops of it still drip from the edges of his drums, which he played in honor of this Saint Anthony while the stigmatic wounds were still aching in his hands. So much pain and strangeness endured for him, a man merely sitting up on his deathbed.

The Star of David has left its mark on Sid's steady hand, the sharp edges having bitten in and drawn blood while he clutched it safely. He knows what to do.

Clink. Sid drops the emblem of three score. It falls flat onto a smudge of Capa's blood.

"I accept."

Capa

With Sid’s proclamation the form of Saint Anthony dissipates into vapor it travels around Sid and gathers back into Capa. It enters his mouth and nose and it’s gone within seconds. The drumming comes to a halt and Capa's eyes roll back as if he was sleep but his eyelids remain open. “Come Sid Berkowits” Saint Anthony’s voice can be heard speaking through Capa again.

Capa/Saint Anthony stands and walks to the altar. There he cuts a length of hemp twine from a spool and then dips it into a bowl of water. Reaching under the white cloth covering the altar top, he pulls out jars of beads. He takes three black beads and three red beads and drops them into the bowl. A few whispered words are spoken and Capa/Saint Anthony takes out the hemp and beads form the water. Stringing the beads, the three red beads first followed by the three black beads, he ties them off in the center with a knot on each side of them. He then turns back to Sid. "Bear these and know that you are a child of he who is called Anthony de Pauda known as Elegba messenger of Raziel and Him Most High."

Sid Berkowitz

Sid Berkowitz watches the holy procession in a daze. He is no longer on earth, and yet, he is not yet dead, though there is an angel in his midst. Saint Anthony prepares a necklace of beads, black and red, and a flash of memory, a piece of late seventies cinema, is blown up on a grainy screen in his mind - a withered, browned, South American woman's hand, clutching a rosary of beads, black and red, with a downy feather tickling her knuckles.

Dreamily, he reaches for the string of beads and takes it into his hand. "Yes," is all he can say.

Capa

The candle flickers out and the room goes dark. Sid and Capa stand in the darkness. Capa walks across the room and on his way, there his foot catches something on the floor. He bends over to pick it up. Taking the Star from the floor, he walks over to the light switch. "You might want to close your eyes." The lights turn on with the flick of the switch.

"It has been a long night do you want some thing to drink" Capa stands at the entrance to the living room. His shirt and shoes are still off. "We can talk. If you have any questions, I may be able to answer them for you.

Sid Berkowitz

"I wouldn't know where to begin. Oi." Dazed, but smiling a little, Sid wanders around in his socks. "Oi," he repeats, sitting down on a couch in the living room. Breathing deeply, he puts his head in his hands.

And he begins to cry, for the first time in many, many years.

Capa

"Yes it is a lot to take in at once."

Capa sees Sid crying and he walks up to him. He places one blood stained hand on Sid's shoulder. "It is a blessing to be addressed directly by the Oshira. I can't even begin to understand how you feel. I was a boy when I came to know the Saints and Angels. But you are of a wiser age and different upbringing."

Capa holds out the star of David. "Your dropped this. I think you may want it."

Sid Berkowitz

"Even if only for comfort," Sid nods, clearing his throat and taking the Star back. The metal was cold in his hands. He remembered the old Rabbi who gave it to him, so long ago. It was practically an antique.

"Capa, what am I to do? I feel what has transpired, but it is almost too impossible to believe, like a dream. It is strange, but I've stopped hoping I simply wake up in the morning. Now, I hope I wake up and remember what has happened. Do you understand, Capa?"

Capa

"This 'Capa' you speak to, does not hold any answers. The only true powers that can help with your problems are the Saints. The Saints that guide and protect us, praised they be.

"From my understanding this dream you speak of is the effect of your inability to come to terms with your life. Your are an old-man and as all viejos you believe that you have wasted your life and have nothing to show for it.

"AWAKE UP. The only purpose in life is to live it to the best of your abilities. What can't you let go of? Is it your pride? Will your circle of friends disprove of your life? Live Sid and honor Him most High, the Orisha and your lineage." Capa seems to be walking a bit more regally, like someone who is accustomed to give commands and have them followed.

"Go and amend for the sins and dishonorable acts that you have committed, praise the Saints, and Live. Viejo, your time is short be rid of your sins and live virtuously.

Sid Berkowitz

Sid Berkowitz was wrong. He should have wondered whether he was already asleep and dreaming this.

"Capa?" he ventures, noticing a change in the young man's attitude. His youthful respect and vibrance seem replaced by a more worldly, midlife confidence. But instead of protesting, Sid merely listens to all of Capa's sage advice.

"I have nothing to show for my life," he repeats, nodding sadly. "Once I am gone, the money in savings will mean nothing." Capa continues, and Sid's head bends low in humility. "I lost my pride when I became old, Capa. And I lost any friends who could disapprove of me. It is only doubt that makes me hesitate. It is a heavy burden, and not one I can rid myself of so easily. I do not know how! I want to live!" he lifts his head, rubbing tears out and breathing deeply.

"I finally want to live, but I am old and there is not much life left in me. By His grace, I should Honor Him most High, but I am just glad to be alive! I do not know who the Orisha are, but if it is to them that I owe some small measure of happiness, I will honor them."

Sid swallows. "Yes, I have sinned, and I no longer know if God's grace will speed me into heaven as one of his children, with what I have now done and what I have seen. I never thought one as old as I could be the prodigal son..."

But even he was forgiven when he returned, Sid reminds himself. And are you sure you've even left?

"How am I to be rid of my sins? God has salvaged my soul in years past, but what do you say I must do with this weight?"

Capa

Your sins are forgiven by the Lord all you have to do is ask. Then you must seek the Saints for spiritual healing. The hardest part will be forgiving yourself. I can sit behind a screen and you can tell me what you have done wrong. Then I will tell you that you must donate money to me and you will be forgiven. Does that sound good to you?" a smile creeps up on his face. "Here I have heard that this works, Take and write down your burden. Then you must burn it and pray to the saints. Burn it with the flame of a candle dedicated to Me. If that does not ease your burden then come back to me and we will try some thing else."

Capa stands up and walks into his kitchen "Wait here." He comes back with a red candle inside of a black tinged glass tube. "Here this one should do. I would like to offer it freely but they are used for the services and I do not have many left. Ten bucks should be enough for it and don't worry you can give it to me later." The candle is about a foot tall and 3 inch in diameter. The picture of Saint Anthony adorns the glass.

Sid Berkowitz

"I can give it to you now," Sid waves his hand, removing a twenty dollar bill from his wallet and holding it out towards Capa. "You can give me the change later."

Saint Anthony watches the exchange in pious humility, rendered in an artistic watercolor at the base of the candle. Sid Berkowitz stares at the picture, as new realizations dawn upon him - the man in the picture looks almost exactly like the spirit which called itself Saint Anthony, the spirit that had revealed itself to him! How could this all be happening? He knew he should disbelieve it all, but he wanted to hold onto it, even as he felt a comforting monotony lulling him back to dwelling on the distracting matter of impending death, and the little bottle of pills in his coat pocket.

"I was Jewish, not some meshugeneh Catholic, shagetz" Sid smiles, appreciating Capa's sense of humor. It helped to put him at ease, especially with how strange the young man was acting. Could it be loss of blood making him so ungepatched? The thought bothered Sid, but he was a young man, and he could take care of himself. "I don't know what I am now, though. Very traif, though. Very." He nods, trying to feel out this sensation of no longer being kosher.

"I will take this home with me, to do as you suggested. I have lived a long life, and a list of all my sins will be a daunting task. But I want to do it right. Not hasty. Maybe just seeing them down in writing again will remind me of where I've been, and what I've done."

Maybe make me feel young again? he hopes faintly, staring at Capa's youthful face. Clamping a smile behind tearing eyes, he reaches out and pats the priest's face. "Thank you. You're a real hamisch, you know that?"

Capa

Taking the money from Sid, Capa walks over to the shrine again. He goes back under the cloth and pulls out a lockbox. He takes out a key, which dandles on one of his many necklaces and opens it. “Here you go, the change.” He walks back over to Sid.

“Listen brother this is how I see it. The Lord created many things in heaven and earth. Some of those things we have no comprehension of what they are or why they even exist. The Saints are just one of those things that can’t be explained they just is. May be they where able to hangon after death having believed that their work was not done or they might be Ancients created by the Allfather to look after us. Who know? But they are real. As real as that candle that I gave you. I myself, am a Christian Santero but there are others who worship similar things but they are called something different. I have learned that they are the same. The Saints are the Orisha of the Great African religions. It will be your path to find whatever truths are your own. I cannot tell you that the Jews are wrong because I have found that these Orisha manifest in different forms for different people. For me they are the Saints of my childhood for others they are the Great African gods. They both serve the same purpose and that is to guide and protect us.”

He takes the ten and places it in Sid’s hand with a handshake. “You need me to come with you home?”

Sid Berkowitz

"And no matter what you believe, the Saints, the Orisha, still exist, as real as you or I." Sid Berkowitz marvels at the idea, one that he's visited in the past, but never experienced. It was meant to be a question to Capa, but it came out a statement. He believes in Capa's Saints more than he'll admit.

"Thank you," he says, taking the ten. "I...I would enjoy that, if you don't have anything else to tend to. You bring up so many things about your childhood that influenced you to seek your answers in Santeria. I would like to know. About you. About Them. It will help me to understand to hear more and more, more than I can get in a single Wednesday night visit. Will you come home with me and share? I will call you a taxi to bring you back home, once we arrive."

[Thee Independent]

Capa

"Ok let me clean some of this up before we go." Moving quickly, he walks out of the room and returns with a bucket full of soapy water and a mop. Reaching down he grabs a rag from the bucket and wipes down the drum. He then dries it and coats the goat hide drumhead with an oily substance. Next, he passes the mop over the floor cleaning the blood as best that he can. He takes everything back once he is done. Throughout he talks. "Bueno, you know were I come from so let me describe it. We lived in the mountains; not mountains like around here. More like rolling hills but they were high. Most were covered with trees and they had patches cleared out on them for cow pastures. Everything was green and Blue. The skies were very beautiful, no haze, it was always crystal clear. The mountains, in the distance were doted with one or two houses.

"We where Catholic and so when I was old enough to count and read I began catechism classes. Doña Luz was our teacher. She was and still is a very wise lady. 'Curandera' Is what all the grownups called her. To me that meant that she was a doctor. If some one was sick she would come and give them teas, roots to eat, pray for them, and then they would get better. That all I knew, you know.

"So at Catechism classes she would teach us the Bible and the rosary. When she taught us the bible. She would also teach about the Angels, demons, Saints, and Virgenes. We learned to go through the Rosary, to the point that we could recite the whole thing frontward and backward in our sleep. I remind you we were all five to nine years old, so it was a great feat that she could hold our interest. Telling us stories about our ancestors, Holy people, and Native legends, she managed to do it.

"The first time that I saw the great Guardians was in her class going through the rosario. I looked up to where she stood and around here where five glowing figures. One was a black-man with a feathery coat wrapped around him. Another I would later come to know as Saint Anthony with his red and black robes. Yet another was a strange short woman, she stood naked but for a small stone bead necklace. The Saint, San Juan, as I would later come to know him stood to her right in his yellow and white robes. The last one was the same as the black-man but he was white. It lasted only a second but it was undeniable. I was scared and just closed my eye as the two beings with the feather coats lifted their arms and the coats unfurled into expansive wings. They most have been about twelve feet from tip of wing to tip of wing. When I opened my eyes they were all gone and Doña Luz was again alone reciting the rosary with us."

Sid Berkowitz

Capa cleans up the holy implements of the Orisha’s Will-be-Done; the bloody floor, the stained batas, the appearance of sacrifice and spiritual toil. All is returned to a moderate-looking room with a South American culturual influence. Sid Berkowitz listens, restoring his appearance to normalcy, like Capa does with his home. He replaces his shoes, and is no longer treading the world with the bare feet that came from the earth and will return to it. A fond smile overtakes him while his stubby fingers rebutton the coat up his front, tiny mandalas of polished gold slipping into cloth-frayed holes. Capa’s description of his home is charming and picturesque. Sid can see it in his mind’s eye. The young man’s words keep him grounded, and remind him that even though he looks like the same Sid Berkowitz who drove to this out-of-the-way neighborhood with the weight of Job on his heart, he is not the same Sid Berkowitz. Something inside is different, changed.

“I have always wanted to visit your part of the world, Capa,” Sid admits, brushing a hand through his thin, white hair. “Once upon a time, I wrote many movie scripts, small features, really, about angels and how they worked in our life. To hear your upbringing, I would believe you were brought out from one of my settings. The fascination is still so strong – the Catholic faith, the belief not only in God but in his Kingdom and its stewards, the angels. Your people,” he says, a bit clumsily, not knowing how to address Capa’s foreign background, “see the Saints in rivers, or reflected by the sunlight in the glossy mirrors of a highrise building. The Virgin Mary is an omnipresent phantom, always somewhere, giving people the hope they need to keep their faith. And the stories…I have many, many of them catalogued somewhere, immigrants I tracked down to listen to. I listened with an artist’s heart, not a believer’s, but now…I must revisit them.”

Once Capa has his place fully cleaned and secured, Sid walks with him out to the car, a roomy, spacious gray Lincoln Towncar. The interior is as well-oiled as Capa’s drums, but smells less earthy and more industrial, the fading aroma of “new car” scent. “I will that cab from my house to bring you back here,” he offers, putting the key in the ignition and starting the car. Before taking off, he asks, “Why do think those Saints visited you when they did? Why did they come to you, and to no one else around you? Was this ever explained to you?”

Capa

After listening to Sid for a while Capa asks him. "Are you feeling ok Sid? I am not Capa I am called Anthony." Capa/Anthony's face looks concerned at Sid.

"Pero si, people have esplained it to me like this. We each have our role to play in life and I have been chosen by the Saints to be the voice to my people. I have come across others that have also been touched by the Saints but they are blind to them. They hold to there own ideals, grandiosos, to explain the miracles that they have been blessed with."

Sid Berkowitz

Sid scratches at his chin, still not knowing what to make of Capa's confusion. Or could it be Sid who is confused? Maybe Anthony is his real name, his given name, or the name he has taken on for himself, in honor of his patron.

"It is nothing, really, Anthony," he corrects himself, hoping that might put an end to it. "But you are so young. You say you have been chosen by the Saints, but what about your other concerns? An education? A family? Have you willingly given these things up, or do you have to? You talk as though so much has been decided for you. What do you plan? Do you have your own wants?"

Capa

"I know what you mean Sid and yes I do have other concerns. Education is not one of them. You don't know this but I have an Associates Degree in Business and had enough credits and a high enough GPA to enter the University of my choice. I have no regrets in having left school. Dona Luz has provided a better education in medicine than any University could ever hope to give.

"What I do now is fulfilling, You know, it fills me with joy to know that I can be of help to my community. The pay is not much but I have all that I need.

"As for that family, yes one day I will meet the woman for me. Then we can have a family. No rush in it for there is a time and place for everything. If a family is my destination then the Saints will provide. I can not say the same for my current family though.

"That is the one sacrifice that has been the hardest to accept. Papá has taken my choice the hardest. He doesn't talk to me any longer. Says that What I do is 'Charlataneria' a crazy man's religion. He says it is as fake as all the breast in Hollywood." Capa/Anthony puts up a halfhearted smile up to cover the hurt.

"But really, it has not been decided for me, I make the choice to sacrifice what I have to. The community needs help, it is in pain, and I find that I can help. It may just be one person, but if it is only one person then that is more than Noah managed to help."

Sid Berkowitz

"An Associates Degree? Ca...Anthony, that is wonderful," Sid corrects himself. "I never realized. Maybe sometime you can return to school. University students need ministering, too. Sorely, from what I understand," he nods, wheeling the Towncar through the streets with ease. Sid Berkowitz drives at night like an elderly person drives on a Sunday afternoon once the late service is out: slow and plodding, as though absorbing all of the inspiration of the sermon were more important than paying attention to the road.

Cars continue to pass in the left lane, and Sid drives along, in no hurry. "No, I can imagine the pay is not much." A thought tugs at the back of Sid's mind, but he tucks it away, giving his attention to Capa.

"I am sorry that your father does not believe in you. I never had any children of my own. Now, it is too late for a family." Capa tries to hide his hurt behind a joke, and though it makes Sid smile, he doesn't miss the pain involved. "You are a grown man now, Capa. Young, but capable of making your own way in the world. Many people do not know, but a lot of Jewish, like me, had to make a hard decision in the years leading up to the Second World War. Many young Jewish men left Germany to evade the growing persecution, leaving their fathers to handle the family businesses - and the families, which were often quite big. It left a lot of bad blood, you know, to desert when some might say you were needed most. But we had to make our own decisions, and I am glad you have made yours."

His hands tighten on the steering wheel. Talking to Capa was, in some way, beginning to feel like talking to the son he never had. Yes, it sounded cliché, something appropriate to one of his old scripts, but the emotions still bubbled to the surface. "I want only the best for you," he says, turning his head to the side and looking at Capa. "You give so much to the community, but someone should give to you."

You no longer have a family to do it. And I don't see you with any friends, Sid thinks, but he is too afraid to point out Capa's loneliness. "What more can I do, instead of coming to terms with...everything...and continuing to come on Wednesdays? What do you need?"

Capa

Capa/Anthony pauses for a minute thinking about the last question to come from Sid. "People to believe. You know Sid that people just have very little faith in the Spirits anymore. I still remember when the Curandero was a respected person in the community and usually the first one the people turned to for help. But that is no longer the case. People view us as the last resource.

"I need you to have faith that there is a purpose to this world. That we can make a difference in others' and ours lives. That's what I need and that is what the Saints and Ancestors need. The congregation provides enough to keep the church open and I can make enough to keep myself but faith can't be bought. Tu sabes?

"There is also a need for some of us to look after each other. Right now once we get to your place I have to go check on Cheryl. We need to take care of each other and I think that if you can look after Elvie that would help. You know I worry about her."

TI

Time: Sid Berkowitz, though short on the resource, could dedicate what he has left in this world to the Spirits, to Capa's ministry in Santeria. He is retired, and no longer works. He has no family to distract him from pursuing greater achievements in honor of the multi-fold Orisha. Time is something Sid can contribute, and he does so, spending several minutes on their drive into the valley talking to Capa about the importance of ritual to Santeria. The Jewish faith is also full of ritual, he explains, and takes Capa through a list of some of their more esoteric practices, including the father's gratitude to God that he is no longer responsible for his son's observation of God's law (the barmitzvah) and the all-too-common and feared "cessation of impurity" (the bris).

Money: Sid Berkowitz is not a stereotype of his culture, but one thing does remain true to the heritage. The man has spent decades of his life working, saving, and most importantly, investing in the right places, and with keen frugality and patience he has managed to amass a considerable fortune. Capa would not necessarily know this as they pull up to Sid's home, a cozy suburban home built in an ungated community established back in 1963. Razorbrush and stunted palm trees rise through an extended bed of burgundy lava rock, sitting still and peaceful. A one story, low-roof house sits between two others houses that look nothing like it. By the time Sid pulls up the concrete driveway and into the garage, Capa can see why. The neighbors' homes have been remodeled. Sid's has been refurbished and touched up, but still has a 60s feel to it - and 60s colors, retro pastel green, earthworm brown, and shell pink. It is not unlike many of the homes still standing in the poorer parts of the San Fernando Valley. Sid invites Capa inside and directs him to take a seat on a couch upholstered in plaid. There is a teal recliner in the corner, covered with plastic. The kitchen appears dingy at first, but when Sid turns on the light to use the phone to call Capa a cab, the young priest can see it is just the kitchen's color scheme, a faded banana yellow that makes one think of cigarette tar stains. But the house smells pleasantly of vanilla and toffee.

The meager living is just one of Sid's financial reservations. Capa could have asked for money, but what he needed was the hardest thing for Sid to give.

Belief: Sid Berkowitz has the power to phone up a taxi for Capa and believe that it will get him home safely. He possesses the ability to dream, even when awake, to venture beyond the pale and see things not as he knows them to be, but as they are. Already, Capa has taken him to the razor's edge of disbelief. Tonight, he walked the line between life and death and felt in his very soul the grip of a Angel more powerful than the mighty human imagination. But where does he begin to believe? What value does belief have, to anyone but Sid Berkowitz? As he hangs up the phone, the old Jewish man stands in the kitchen and leans against the counter, removing the bottle of pills and placing them on the counter. He had asked Capa, What can I do for you? And Capa asks him to simply, Believe. From where Sid stands, he is the only one to benefit from taking the plunge of blind faith. It could mean the salvation or damnation of his soul and no one else's. It could bring him happiness while others continue to struggle.

Sid Berkowitz stands at the edge of the kitchen, watching Capa. He understands now, what he means. I am too old, and have too little to give, and bless him, he wants me to see to myself before I see to others. He is the one with obvious need, and he sacrifices that to set me on my way.

"Your cab is on the way, Anthony." It's been a long time since Sid has heard an edge of excitement, maybe true happiness, in his voice. Funny, that it can be heard in the most mundane statement.

Capa

"Ok Sid, but uknow that St. Anthony hasn't channeled through me for a while now. I know, it gets confusing.

"You got a nice house here Sid, and it Feels good too. The Orisha smile down on this place." Capa walks around admiring the tranquility of the place. "Don't ever change a thing about the house there is much power in the memories of it." Touching the red and black beads around his neck, Capa can feel the Opener near. He closes his eyes and murmurs a prayer. "San Antonio abre me la vista al alla." (open my sight to the other place)

Capa's eyes open and he speaks softly to himself again. "Con la vista de Los Santos enseña me el alla.(With the sight of the Saints show me what lays on the other side)". His voice sounds ancient and the feeling spreads outwards form him.

TI

The antiquated colors and furniture in Sid's home begin to fade, their fabric threads replaced by the faint collection of colorless memories locked between the cushions. Saint Anthony guides Capa's vision beyond this material realm, bypassing the abrasive storm of Separation between where Capa stands and where he now sees.

It is as Capa had expected: the subtle taste of memories gloss this home in abundance. A desk in the corner burns with the remnants of creative passion. It must have been the place where Sid spent so many years typing his many manuscripts. Strong currents of comfort emenate from a recliner several paces in front of the television, having in recent years become the old man's respite when he grows weary, where reliable television programming can sedate and sometimes inspire him to happier thoughts. And enveloping it all, humming in through the windows and the doors, is the embodiment of age in these grounds, a force even older than Capa himself: yes, the house has been here for a very long time, longer than its neighboring lots stunted or youthfully excited by community growth.

Still, though, there is something else, tugging at the very edges of Capa's sense: nothing he can see is as powerful, nothing he can hear is as prominent, nothing he can taste is as bittering, nothing he can smell is as faint, nothing he can touch is as old - no, not old. Whatever it is, it is ancient. And to Capa, familiar, yet unfamiliar, curling up like a lazy cat in the center of his sixth sense.

Capa. Sid's voice sounds strange, coming through to Capa by way of ears left in the false world, trying to break through a mind focused on the "real world" he's investigating.

Sid's spirit resonates with age and wisdom, and a little excitement. But when Capa focuses on the old man, what he sees comes as such a strong shock to him that it threatens to crumble his perception and catapult him back the way he came!

A mask overtakes Sid's soul, covering the crown behind which his Mind pulsates. Hollow black eyes regard Capa for the instant it remains, surrounded by bristling black raven feathers. An incomprehensible beak extends from the mask, clamped closed, concentrating intensely on the set of senses that stare out at it, looking through the Gauntlet. A buzzard's harsh squaw echoes in Capa's memories, and in a burst of feathers, the entity's mask vanishes from Sid Berkowitz, bearing Sid's Spirit again plain to see.

What should be a powerful Spirit within Sid Berkowitz is both frozen in place and pulled drastically into different directions, as invisible hands that Capa cannot detect seem to stretch and bend but never warp or tear the man's malleable Spirit.

Capa

Capa holds finger to his mouth "Shhh" asking Sid to hold still.

"Cunda cuncuando en mascara de pajaro.
Descarate cuncuando que babalao ba pasando.
Que vuitre de alma a papa Capa no espantas.
Con plumas de espanto tu cubres tu rasgo
Enseña tu mano que del babalao no cubres tu paso"

(Cunda cuncuando in birds mask.
Unmask your self cuncuando that babalao passes through here.
That you vulture of souls, you don't scare papa Capa.
With feathers of fright you cover your visage
Show your hands dealing, that from the babalao you don't hide your passing.)

Capa's voice reverberates with the power of ages it sounds like the voice of hundreds generations speaking at once. He grips a charm that hangs around his neck. His hands tremble from the tight grip.

There is something there which evades him. He follows the pull of ages, to which he has grown accustomed. The rituals and lore that he uses have been passed down from generations of priest. The line is so ancient, that it leads to the heart of Africa. It has left a mark on him which he now calls on to bring forth or at least understand the spirit.

TI

Capa matches year for year the Ancient presence, the Raven-faced masque, invoking it to heed to the call passed down through generations, his voice echoing in Plato's realm of the Ideal. But the elusive spirit's face is gone, leaving only the work of its hands to be seen, as Capa commanded.

Adjusting his perceptions, the Santeria Priest reconsiders the acts that may have been committed, and to that extent, their potential results. The empathic pull of Sid's home diminishes, as things like passion, age, and comfort fade to the background. They are replaced gradually by a three-dimensional line, whose constantly shifting planes are determined by consequence, happenstance, and most powerful of all, Choice.

Sid's spiritual Pattern hangs in the balance of Entropy, spread in two opposing directions like a great Bird's wingspan. There is minimal activity from within Sid, a growing desire, if not absolute control, over the motion of those wings. But he has not the strength to fold them, or to take flight, either.

Instead, there are things...forces...powers...beings?...possibilities tugging from the outside upon Sid. One trail, a wing with feathers as pitch black as midnight, extends off into the distance, to untraceable, unfathomable ends. A sense of dread for Sid's future blows from this path of Chance, chilling Capa beyond his bone, and down to his very soul.

The other trail extends, surprisingly, directly into Capa! An angel's wing, visualized by Sid's own strong regard for the young Dreamspeaker. Capa is not only his Priest, but also his savior, graced by the touch of the Angels. Capa feels as though he could reach out and tug upon that swaddling wing, and Sid's own physical body would tumble in his direction.

And just as he begins to think it, there comes the sense of a tugging in the distance. A ringing phone? Voices. Too many confusing things, garnered from the future or the past or, just maybe, this very moment in time.

Capa

There is an eternal moment when Capa stares into Sid’s eyes. There is a look of curiosity on his face that quickly changes to concern.

“Sid do you trust me?” Capa looks directly at the man again, not through him. “There’s something which I gotta show you before I go. It’s a ritual purification that will help to strengthen tu soul y cuerpo. Got some Epson salt around?”

Sid Berkowitz

What strangeness was this now? Sid watches Capa, seeing the growing concern on his face, as though he were taking notice of something completely beyond anyone but the priest.

"Something to strengthen my soul and...ah, yes, I believe I do. Have some Epson salt, I mean, in the pantry."

Berkowitz disappears into the kitchen and rifles through the pantry. A bag labeled Epson salt sits in a plastic tub that he used to use to salt his feet several years ago when he used to jog. The salt has been sitting there for a very long time. He had completely forgotten about it, until now.

He returns to the living room, bag of Epson salt clutched against his chest. "I found it."

Capa

"That should be good. I'm going to show you something that my Doña Luz use to have the people she looked after, do. This should all so help with any aches that you may have. Do you have any regular white candles. They will help to bring you closer to Saint Anthony."

Capa is already turning to head to the bathroom. "Come show me where you bathtub is. I'll help to prepare the bath and then leave you to enjoy it."

Sid Berkowitz

"I'm pretty sure I have some candles, and I think they're white. I keep them around in case the power ever goes plotz. The bathroom is at the end of the hall, and there's a tub inside."

Sid disappears into his bedroom, scrounging around for the candles. In the bottom drawer of his nighttable, next to a box of mathces, are three long, off-white candlesticks to be used in the event of a power outage. He picks all three of them up and walks into the restroom. "I have three of them."

Capa

Capa takes the candle and lights them using his yellow lighter. He drips wax on to a plate and adheres the candles to it. "Place them in a row like so and when they get to the mark" he takes a nail and marks off a spot about a quarter of the way down the candle. "You have spent enough time in the bath." Placing the plate on the sink, he turns off the lights in the room. He turns on the water faucet for the tub and begins to fill it. Then he takes four fistfuls of Epson salt and throws them into the bath. "Atendenos San Juan en este ritual, te llamamos en necesidad the una cura. Que San Juan bendiga esta agua para purificar la alma de Sid Berkowitz. (Saint John, attend this ritual for we call you in need of healing. Bless these waters Saint John to purify the soul of Sid Berkowitz.)" He dips his hands in to the water and stirs. When the water is up to the level of that he desires Capa turns to Sid.

"Bien, That should be enough water."

Sid Berkowitz

"This should feel wonderful. It's been ages since I've just sat down to take a hot bath. It'll be good for the bones," Sid remarks, facing Capa and smiling. Over his shoulder, Capa can see the bathwater steaming and waving, even after Sid has turned off the water.

"So, when the candle has burned down just so much, I've been in long enough," he states, just to be sure. Behind him, the bathwater stills suddenly. On the surface, a disturbance in the center causes a tiny ripple to go out to the ring and back again, as though someone had placed their finger directly in the water.

Beep beeeeeep!

"Sounds like your cab is here, Capa," Sid announces, moving out of the bathroom and towards the front door to make sure. He peers through the curtains. "Yes, it's waiting."

[Thee Independent]

Capa

Ok Sid, We will pick up again later and if you need me before next week don’t be afraid to call and leave a message if I’m not home.” Capa shakes Sid’s hand and kisses him on both cheeks “Que los Santos the bendigan. Chao. (May the Saints bless you? Ciao.)

Turning, Capa heads out to his cab. He is hesitant to leave Sid alone but hopefully Saint Anthony will look after his own and Saint John has worked his part. The house is powerful and should help to anchor Sid. But what was that Vuitre up to. There is some thing to contemplate tonight. The thing was ancient and directly opposing the Saints work. Well for now I will wait and see.

Once he is out of the door he checks his pockets for fair.

Sid Berkowitz

“I will, Capa. Thank you so much. For everything.”

Sid pauses at the door. “I…I may call you, soon. I have a lot of thinking to do.” He smiles, watches Capa to the cab, and then closes his door. Minutes later, he is soaking in the bathtub, holding a 1000+ page book in his hands. A classic Italian painter’s rendition of a Moses-God figure, wrapped in Jehovah’s red robes, raises his hand and speaks the words on two tablets cradled in his arm. The title reads The Five Books of Moses, by Robert Alter.

Slowly, he thumbs through the book, looking at the pages while the heat seeps in through his pores, massaging his weary bones. He had meant to read this book years ago, due to its sheer controversy in Temple. Alter invested years of his life retranslating the original Hebrew text of the Torah to produce a version more true to its roots, a gesture considered gracious by scholars and radical, even heretical, by Rabbis. But what if he had stumbled upon things more True than what hands throughout the centuries had endlessly copied and recopied into their own vernacular? This book in his hands could hold more secrets than anyone knows.

From what Capa says, the Orisha are the oldest. They know the Truths. Might any of them speak to him, through Alter, through this reinterpretation of the Torah? Sid Berkowitz has an understanding of strange connections that work in the world and signify the Divine at work – he incorporated this idea into many of scripts. Is it providence, that the author’s name is Alter?

He reads, from a point he stopped at last year.

God’s breath hovering over the waters…

TI

Outside, Capa approaches the white taxi cab, digging for fare. The cabbie leans over and struggles to roll the passenger side window down. “Hey, mac. Don’t worry about the money. Whoever called left a credit card number, so we just charge it later. Ain’t technology wonderful?”

The cabbie doesn’t sound convincing. The new credit card payment implemented in Los Angeles was eating into his tips. When people don’t have to dig into their wallets, he gets stiffed more often on the extra. After gathering Capa’s location, the cab driver takes off from Sid’s house and drives in the general direction of the Priest’s neighborhood.

Capa is feeling good, despite the strangeness he witnessed within Sid’s home. He feels like he got through to one of his flock, and is making a difference in the life of someone who truly needs it. It is amazing how the Saints seem to redouble their efforts, through Capa, when there is so great a need. Even in one old man. As the driver moves the taxi out onto the main road, Capa’s good feelings begin to ebb.

“Omi tutu, ana tutu.”

The driver’s hairy chin wobbles beneath his chanting lips. His eyes stare at the road, blankly.

“Tutu lle, tutu laroye.”

Capa’s slow-moving cab moves into the right lane and cruises. The driver looks into the rear view mirror, staring at Capa in the back seat. His eyes are strange: deep, endless, and darkening even as Capa watches.

“Elegua abre la puerta en mi intervención. No esté asustado, Capa. ¿Usted sabe quiénes soy?”

Whatever has a hold on the innocent cab driver does not radiate any malice, towards Capa or anyone else. It speaks in a measured, too perfect, too impersonal Spanish that sounds strange to Capa's ears, almost as though the words were being translated through the cabbie's lips from a language more primal.

"We have already met, you and I. Though it was for the first time. And it was brief. Do you remember? It was not long ago, in the home of a man torn by fate. Do you know me, papa Capa?" he asks, the words transforming gradually into English.

Capa

Capa tenses the fact that an Orisha manifests with out a call is enough to bring some concern. Capa is just glad that he keeps candy on him. This is the second night that he has been called on.

“San Antonio abre las puertas de todos nuestros esfuerzos.
El guardia de las encrucijadas.
I mensajero de Dios.

“El Babalao listens. What massage do you bring.”

No. This was not an Orisha he now realizes this.

“Pajaro negro yes I know you. Briefly si, I know you. Now tell me what is it you want.” Capa straightens in his seat his voice reverberates in the cab.

TI

Capa's driver goes silent and returns to looking at the road. A score of headlights pass on the left, their beams streaking in through the windshield and blinding Capa, who is sitting in the back seat. Once the cars pass, the driver is looking over his shoulder at Capa...only through the empty eyes of the "black bird" Capa saw earlier. This time, it seems like no mask. Capa can feel that long, black beak's sharp and dangerous tip, and the feathers flutter in the cool breeze coming from the air conditioning vent.

"What I want is to warn you, Capa. Nothing more, nothing less. Sid Berkowitz is a man torn between two coming fates. You have given him one alternative, Capa, but only one. There are other forces working upon him that are beyond your comprehension. I know what they are, though I do not know what form they will take."

Though the spirit speaks through the feathered mask over the driver's face, the beak does not move. The voice is ephemeral, coming from a source beyond this plane. Despite its constant attention to Capa, the driver's body seems perfectly capable of maneuvering the vehicle safely through the traffic.

"You saw me when I, bidden as I am by Oludamare, took roost within Sid's spirit. And I saw you. It was a meeting that was not meant to be, but perhaps it is a sign of fortune. Things are moving and changing in the World, and what they mean, we have yet to know. You are young, vibrant, and powerful, Papa Capa. You are not expected to see me, to know me. Not yet. Only those whose fates have taken final flight shall know me."

At last, the head turns away from Capa, staring out at the road in front of the taxi. The newly tarred street is pitch black beneath the headlights.

"I guide them from Here to There, as I now guide you from Sid's Home to your Home. Their spirit becomes my perch until I must spread my wings and leave with them. The closer to fate they are, the more they come to know me."

A single car passes again on the left, its headlights low and warm and unimposing on Capa's eyes, like the flickering realization of a tender memory.

"Dona Luz knew me, Capa. She considered fighting me, driving me from my nest within her spirit. And she did, for many years. But eventually she knew me as her friend, and I carried her to Oludamare's bosom. Never once did she curse Sino," it announces its name with the same vibrancy as Capa's voice. "Nor should you. I am the Orisha none must know until the End. And for Sid, that End is coming, Capa. You have done what you can. You have time to do more."

Click. On the dashboard, the fare meter finally turns over and starts counting.

"But not much."

Capa

"If I have time to do more Sino, Then tell me what the forces acting upon Sid are so that I may at least know their source." Capa's voice has lost the defensive edge that it held. "With your Calling of Saint Anthony to open the way you have gain some mesure of respect. It gives proof to your claim of knowing the Orisha and of being the hidden one. I will leave an offering of Orchids and bonbon de menta for you at the shrine."

Capa looks on with feelings of finality for Sid. "So his time comes. That is the way of things I know but you speak to Osain's Babalao and For all of my respect for death you know that I must do everything within my power to keep you from taking flight with Sid's Soul. This does not make you my enemy but...Well You know its just the way of things."

TI

"I understand, Papa Capa. Remember, though, that you may stand in my way all you wish, but I will not be stopped. The forces working to bring about the man Sid Berkowitz's fate are strong. So strong that even Sino cannot see them, cannot touch them, cannot know them. Somehow, they have cheated me, and bested by them, I must leave them be."

Sino, the hidden Orisha, raises a hand from the steering wheel. Dark feathers, with nebulous space between the ridges, whisk about the fingers in an entrancing dance. These are the hands that caress the Spirit into the greater realms, unlocking it from the temporary Life shell.

"But it is not so with you. I am the dog at their heels. Yet never can I catch them. You are not bound by divine law, Capa. By Oladumare's will, we guide you, teach you, work through you, but you are the Saint of Change. By your own Virtue, you may make the impossible possible. If you desire to bring the man Sid Berkowitz to a peaceful rest, you must contend with the Other where I cannot."

The hand lowers, and the raven's crooked beak turns again towards Capa.

"It is the desire of the Orisha for the Spirit of man to know us. Saint Anthony Elegba rejoices in delivering the news of an eternally happy Spirit, like Dona Luz. Shango brightens the sky with fireworks and Ochun brings ran to the fields in a shower of joy. Yansa laughs in pride, a powerful gale to clear away the dust of the dead. But Sino..."

Capa can feel the breath leaving his lungs as the Black Bird Mask stares deeply into his very Pattern. Entropy tugs at the fine strings.

"...Sino knows too well how many he must take away from the Orisha, when their Time has come. They celebrate the one white rice in a bowl of black beans. Sino remembers every bean that he took away to Empty Sadness, and cannot rejoice as the others do. Someday, maybe, this will Change."

Papa Capa, the Saint of Change, is released from the Sino's strange power, left humbled before the Dark-Winged Carrier.

"Orchids and bonbon de menta will be nice. When the petals dry on the altar, use them to craft an opele. Orunmila will then deliver her message to you. Be watchful, Papa Capa."

The meter continues to roll. "We are not far from your Home."

Capa

Capa feels the humbling experience of the endless. He brings one hand up to hold a strand of yellow and white beads that belong to San Juan/Osain. "Sino you do not hold an envious position but it is an honorable one none the less.

"I am grateful for your intervention where none was due. I will take your aid and aid you in return. The Other will be found and brought to your knowledge." Capa considers the statement of the bowl of black beans. "yes change must come."

The orchids and mints will rest upon the altar before la luna rises again. And the opele will be shall be made to await Orunmila's message."

"As the roads cross San Antonio brings us together
Until that time comes again were we will meet
Our roads diverge. Sino 'Santo de las Almas'
Papa Capa is grateful. With Orchids y mentas
I shall pay you respect. Your name will be know
In the last hour of life every man shall know
Babalao oh Chavon
Papa Capa se va"

TI

"Gracias, you of many layers," Sino's head lowers as Capa praises him with an impromptu hymn. When the head rises again, the driver's face is no longer covered with the raven-Orisha's dark feathers. The beak is replaced by the crooked nose and bored frown of the driver, who seems oblivious to anything happening to him, or going on around him.

"This is the place," the cabbie announces, pulling up in front of Capa's house. He reaches forward and flips the meter down, resetting it to zero. "It'll be charged to that credit card, so don't worry, mac. Nice night for a quiet ride."

The driver sits and waits for Capa to let himself out, wondering if he'll pull a decent tip out of someone whose fare is pre-paid.

Capa

Capa shifts in his seat and reaches into his pocket to pull out the ten he had on him. "Here you go brodel thanks for the ride. I mira..." Capa has that feeling on him and looks to the man's eyes. "...enjoy every moment like if its the last one you will have. Que los Santos bless you." Stepping out of the cab Capa hopes that his feeling is wrong. "A hora que? Cheryl, lets see if I can get in touch with her and pay a visit to some friends." Capa walks in to the house to gather a few things.

TI

“Kinda hard to enjoy every moment these days, mac, but I do my best,” the driver smiles, sliding Hamilton into his pocket. “Thanks. Good night.”

Capa crosses up the drive, headed towards his home, with yet another of his flock on his mind: Cheryl, whom he had just bailed out of prison for a brutal public disturbance the night before. She had said she would try to make it to the service tonight, but she did not. Sino has told Capa that “the man Sidney Berkowitz” does not have much time left in this world. How much time does Cheryl have, with how swiftly she is moving down a path of personal destruction? The question nags at the back of Capa’s mind, brought about by his encounter with the Orisha of Fate.

There are more people in immediate danger than Cheryl. The hairs on the Dreamspeaker’s neck begin to rise before he has even reached his front door. That terrible feeling he had inside of him, looking upon the driver, intensifies exponentially. At the end of Capa’s street, the cab slowly rolls towards the intersection.

“Hm.” The cab driver stares at the meter and its haunting string of white-on-black zeros strung out beneath his picture ID, labeled Bernie Simpson. Each number is valueless, represented by a circle whose center is black void. No business, no tip.

0000.000

The last digit is always a tricky turnover. Every time Bernie resets the meter, that last display hangs somewhere between nine and zero, making him wonder whether the zero is a full 10 or an empty nothing, or something in between.

Capa can see the red Stop sign clearly from his driveway. In the corner lot, a tree with dark, rum-red leaves provides excellent afternoon shade for the little girls who sell lemonade there on the corner during the summer months, or for the old woman who walks her dogs every morning until sweat glistens on her wrinkled brow. But now those low-swinging branches have reached a dangerous length, and their shadows obscure the Stop sign from the street. Capa expects the cab’s brakes to grind slowly to a halt.

They do not. It keeps rolling forward. Everything happens so slow, yet too fast for anyone to make a difference.

A horn blares. Two massive headlights illuminate the white cab in the split second before the short, sickening scream of metal and shattering glass hit Capa with all the force of a gunshot to the chest. He can see the rice-white cab spinning out of control, and the sleek side of a silver City Transit bus whipping through the intersection like a locomotive.

There is no stop sign on the bus’ path.

Rubber wheels grind against the gravel as the cab spins out of control, T-boned on the driver’s side by the bus. Its headlights are out, blank, and the tires hit the curb with so much force that it launches the vehicle’s side high up into the air, and before Capa can take a breath, the roof of the vehicle slams down onto the corner lot’s green lawn. Industrial glass splinters and scatters across the grass, and the old tree shudders as the front grill scrapes across the trunk, leaving lacerations in the deep, soft bark.

The vehicle stills, and in the silent aftermath of this tragic accident, which no one but Capa witnessed until the bitter end, there is only one other sound aside from Capa’s pounding heart: the memory of Sino’s sad words.

Their spirit becomes my perch until I must spread my wings and leave with them. The closer to fate they are, the more they come to know me.

A Priest always seeks Truths the eternal mysteries of life, but they are not always happy revelations. The Orisha did not visit Capa by sheer accident. He could not have warned him of Sid without the intervention of the fated Bernie Simpson, within whom Sino already perched, awaiting his final moments at 12:01 am…

Dark leaves, shaken loose from the tree by the cab’s impact, glide slowly down through the air like raven feathers, how they fall from the bird’s hide when it suddenly and unexpectedly must take flight.

[Thee Independent]

Capa

Seeing the accident happen, Capa is paralyzed for a split second. He knew that the driver's death would come but not so soon. He runs over to see it there is any help that he can give. The look on his face is worried but he sets himself to work quickly. Knowing the driver was marked for death didn't stop him from going over to the car to see if he might have survived.

"San Juan bendigame with the sight to see the state of this good man who has been a tool of one of your Brothers."

TI

A bedroom light flicks on in the corner household as Capa runs across the lawn, headed for the downed cab. When he crossed around to the other side, he can see Bernie's arm jutting through the window, a shattered portal half-crushed by the vehicle's weight. It lays in the grass, motionless.

San Juan lends Capa his tearful eyes. Through them, Capa can no longer see the unique Pattern that made Bernie Simpson who he was. Like the cab, this Life was shattered on impact; but unlike the cab, the Pattern does not remain as a crushed and broken remnant of the Whole. It is gone, vanished completely, carried back to the reservoir where Sino perches like a bird on the edge of a bath.

A balding, middle-class father is crossing the lawn, a cordless phone pressed against his mouth. "Oh my God," he whispers, glancing at Capa. "Did you see it...?"

Someone answers the phone, and the man turns his back on Capa, walking on the other side of the large tree. "Yes, I need to report an accident at the corner of Fernando and Ebony..."

Capa

"Yea I saw what happened." Capa points to the bus "but first I got to check how the people on the bus are doing."

Turning back to the cab and closing his eyes Capa gives Bernie a quick blessing. "Santos dendiga al alma del difunto (Saint bless the soul of this dead man)" He motions for the man to come with him. "Come they might need our help till the ambulance gets here. There isn't anything we can do for him."

Making his way to the bus Capa doesn't even turn to see if the man has followed him. Upon reaching it, he cautiously approaches the door of the bus.

TI

The bus door opens as Capa approaches. A handful of eyes stare out the window at the overturned cab, at Capa, or at nothing at all in particular.

"I didn't see the cab until it was too late," the bus driver tries to explain to Capa. "There wasn't anything I could do. I had to keep the bus from tipping."

All of the passengers on the bus are all right. Shaken up, yes, but all in good health. They are the graveyard shift people, some dressed in various security uniforms or bland, colorless clothes common to the 1am-9am shift. Within ten minutes, three police cars and a Fire & Rescue vehicle are on the scene. The yellow tape goes up around Bernie's cab, and the dark feather tree on the lawn is bathed in a rolling tumult of red emergency lights.

Capa

Capa slides away form the scene of the accident after checking that the people on the bus were uninjured. Little time left to help Sid and He can't waste much time. He heads down to South Central in search of Oni, a seer. He met her through their common friend, Pedro the owner of "Botanica del Pueblo". It has been a few months since he had spoke to her but he hopes to find her at her previous address.

TI

Taking a cue from Sino, Capa takes flight in the night. But the Santeria Dreamspeaker races to save a life, not to take one away.

Braving South Central's violent night life, where roving gangs will bust your lip or worse for a wallet and where the beat cops have an itchy trigger finger for an ethnic nightwalker like Capa, he finds his way to Oni's home. Her house is not hard to find; it is one of those crumbling shacks located directly off a major thoroughfare, an emblem of poverty that the passengers headed northwards into Hollywood bite their tongue about and ignore. They choose not to recognize the dilapidation, the warping wooden home and its chipping white paint.

The lot is fenced in, but Capa slips quietly through the front gate, entering the unkempt yet verdant lawn. Sharp sawgrass fingers are overgrown across the path, ready to slice cleanly through exposed skin, and great floral bushes bloom in a wild variety of colors around and behind him. Short trees with wide canopies block out the moonlight shortly before Oni's porch, and Capa has the feeling of trudging through the Congo. It reminds him of Oni's Yoruban heritage.

On a carved pedestal to the right of her creaking, mosquito-net covered front door, a small wooden babalawo wearing a shawl of tube shells greets Capa with a flat, large-lipped expression. A distended hand dangles an unclosed band ornamented in even spaces with what appear to be metal tins - an opele with tambourine cymbals. Above the door, another wooden ornament hangs ominously overhead: a double-headed African hatchet, the symbol of Shango, bringer of storm and an Orishan legend for Oni's old tribe.

The woman has no doorbell. Capa is forced to knock. Yellow light gushes out of a side window, and he can hear hard soles pounding on wooden floorboards like a heartbeat. The latch comes undone and the door opens. Two brown eyes peer out through the crack, several inches beneath a rusty iron chain.

"Who is it? Capa?" The recognition is immediate, and so is the irritation. The chain comes undone and Oni opens the door fully. The older black woman flares her nostrils, pointing a brown, twiggish finger at the priest.

"Brother Capa, what you be doing at Oni's door at one in da mawnin'? Make me think the police come again to look for hemp in me yard! Ain't you got no sense?"

Suddenly she stops, peering at Capa's face in the moonlight. She draws a hand to her chest, brushing it across the finely woven African gown, a bright red base dotted with sweeping, impressionistic pictures of magnolias and green bananas.

"Brother, what's wrong? You done seen a ghost. Oni know, she can see, something not right. You pale! Honey, come in, come in, don't mind ol' Oni. No beauty sleep gawna hep me anyway," she finishes, showing open concern and grabbing Capa's wrist, forcefully dragging him into her home.

Capa

Capa stalls at the gate to Oni's home. He looks around at the surrounding neighborhood thinking how much her work mirrors his. The community needs us for without us they have no one to represent them.

He walks up to the house hoping that Oni has a means to help him find this powerful spirit that he has to contend with. The encounter with Sino has shaken him to the core but he understands the purpose of the Orisha. The turning of fate is something that he is familiar with but death remains a mystery. He has spoken to his ancestors but he never considered the necessity for death.

Capa enters and nods to Oni. He takes his time to answer Oni. "Oni beauty sleep can't help you porque your beauty is tu wisdom. Y al how ya look, preciosa. But yea I seen some thing man wasn't meant to see until his death. Sino has come llamado por one of my peoples. He gave me a warning. There are powers beyond his sight fighting against me for the man's fate."

TI

"Bah," Oni flicks her dark hand like an old cat's paw. "You charm an old lady, but youse a young man. Need a young woman, too. Mebbe den you don' come wakin' Oni in the dead of night," she cackles, obviously pleased with Capa's recognition of her wisdom. It is a welcome change from being referred to as the crazy old negro bat next door.

"Sino? Brother, you meet fate and you come to tell me? No, no, no, no, no! I don't know him ain't gawna no time soon." Even though she recognizes the origin of the word, Oni does not seem to recognize it as a name, or as an Orisha.

Soon, she comes in from her dirty, bareboard kitchen with a heated cup of black coffee. "Yirgacheffe, from Ethiopia. Guzman, he got it for me. Heps open de mind, bare de soul, and be happy about it. Drink, Capa, drink," she ushers, pushing the cup into his hands. She then pulls her brilliant cockateel dress about her shoulders and settles into a comfortably cushioned chair that seems out-of-place amidst the wooden and floral and ivory African authenticities. But Oni's back isn't what it used to be, and the woman needs a good chair.

The coffee is lively, even strangely fruity, with a touch of conconut and Tanzanian berries.

"Who be dis man in trouble, your people? How you know he in trouble? What you can't see, mebbe Oni can, hm?" she asks, leaning back in the chair and adopting a calm, attentive look.

Capa

Capa sits with the mug of coffee in his hand. He sips from it tasting the bitterness of the unsweetened black liquid, the berries where a nice touch. “Puya, you know how I like my coffee Oni. It comes form good beans, I can taste it.” Capa takes another sip and lets the aroma enter his nostrils.

“His name is Sid Berkowitz, We had just finished calling his Saint and I went with him to his house. He is one of San Antonio’s children, Elegba answered the call to be his Patron.” Capa sips the coffee briefly and then continues. “I don’t have any experience in divining the road ahead of us or to see into distant places that’s why I came to you. Y, I also was hopping that you knew of this hidden Orisha. He first manifested within Sid but he took flight before I could speak to him. Latter he brought me the warning of the peril that Sid is in by way of the poor cab driver who was destined to die ni un bloque from my place. If this Orisha manifested within Sid it means that he doesn’t have much time left in life. That’s why I came by so late. Sorry.” He makes an apologetic expression with his hand and face at Oni.

TI

"Hidden Orisha?"

Oni leans back in her chair and listens with interest, her spindly fingers twining together like ebony tiger reeds along the Niger. Her concern is transparent, almost like the nightrobe around her body which, in the low light of a living room lamp whose bulb is obscured by great, verdant ferns, displays the shadow of her underbody; the withered curvature of her breasts and the ribbed, wrinkled trunk beneath them. She is not an immodest woman. For Oni, who grew up speaking Yoruba and suffering the pain of lovemaking, modesty can only be found beneath the skin in the form of humility and wisdom. And compassion, too, which she shows Capa when he is finished, spreading her arms and taking his hands.

Dark bags glisten beneath her sugar-brown eyes. "Brother, Oni feel you have seen things meant for you eyes and dem alone. Oni know Shango, de Storm-rider! And Mama Orunmila. And others, too, but no Sino. You must take caution, doh, bruddah, for maybe dis Sino you see be loa, or de malign t'ing eatin' away at yo heart, or worse t'ings Oni know nuttin' abowt."

"But I know you don't go messin' wit nothing gawna hurt'choo. You bright. You wise beyond your years. Ain't hardly had enough time to rack up bad deeds dat need to come back and bitecha. So I be willin' to believe you, no mattah my ignorance."

"Dey be no need for sorries, Capa. Oni know what you be needin'. I tell you. He be a black-faced death, yes? Hollow-eyed, empty soul? You always carry dat wit'choo. When you come 'roun, de plants go mum. They no talk, silent as death. If it be death you huntin', den, Capa, let Mama Oni hep you. She know you nevah any closer to death den when you be sleepin'. Deeeeep sleepin', honey."

She disappears again into the kitchen, which also serves also an impromptu sanctuary for her strange, herbal goods. "Capa, I gonna give you de ceniza del muerte," she says cryptically. He can hear glass jars clinking and her cornhusk sandals whispering around her pantry.

Capa

"Mira, Oni I don't know what I'm chasing. What the black bird told me was that I had to contend with a force which was hidden form him. He sais that he could feel a force but it was outside his grasp. Couldn't see them but he could feel them, Tu sabes. No se, it sounds like the black bird can't reach the land of the living but he can feel it. I'm not sure what to do, to find this force that moves against my work, other than stand watch over el viejo (the old man)." Capa sits and takes a deep breath of coffee aroma while Oni is in the kitchen.

"Senizas del Muerte, Oni? Never been to the land of the Ancestors. Pero if that's what I gatta do then I will."

TI

"It be what you must do!"

Oni returns, bearing a rough-edged mortar and pestil. Under her voice, she grinds down a strange concoction of grays and greens, crushing them together like dried peas and rice.

"You know dat you can't be with the viejo forever," she says, butchering Capa's Spanish with her Nigerian tongue, which rolls out of her mouth vay-ye-ho, the ending vowel too wide and long to be properly spoken. "But Sino say dis force be warkin' to end old man's life, yes? Den it be a mystery of death, and de answer's to those ways don't come t'rough de bones or de happy sow gut. No, no. You gotta get close enough to look witch'yer own eyes, brother."

A mist of powder rises from the glazed ceramic bowl in her hand. Specks of ash dot her work-laden hands, diamonds sparkling in black earth.

"Here be your way to get close to it all, de cenizas del muerte," she finally stops, setting the bowl between the two of them. Several ounces of a fine gray-green powder rest on the bottom. "Dis be your serpent o' de river, who take you dere, you see. But we gotta give it spark," she says, reaching out for a box of matches on the sidetable next to her comfortable chair. "Lest it leave you in de dark. Dat spark be de only t'ing what keeps you breathin'."

Fwish! Oni lights the match and, muttering a minor prayer in Yoruba, drops the lit match into the bowl of powder. One brief pillar of greenish fire bursts in a sparkling, flaming cloud directly out of the bowl's mouth, before extinguishing suddenly. The powder's surface is now a rich blue-ebony.

Like raven feathers.

"Be ye ready, Capa?"

Capa

"Siempre (always), you know that Oni." Capa gives her a smile. Looking into the bowl of ashes Capa settles his cup of coffee on to the table near him.

"Santa Maria Madre De Dios ruega por nosotros pecadores ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte, Amen. San Juan proteje este veiculo a lo que mi alma toma vuelo a las tierras de los muertos. San Antonio abre las puertas y permite me entrada a la tierra de mis ancestros. San Cavallero bendiga me con buena fortuna al otro lado de la vida.

(Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. San Juan protect this vehicle while my soul takes flight to lands of the dead. San Antonio opens the doors and allow my passage to the land of my ancestors. San Cavallero blesses me with good fortune on the other side of life.)"

Capa holds the red and black beads while he sends the prayer to the Saints. The voice is robust and has the sound of ages carried within it. When he is done his eyes open to see Oni's face. "Vamos"

TI

"Vamos."

The instant Capa looks back up at Oni, her hand is held palm up before her dried lips. The old witch's eyes are wide and skeletal. Her cheeks puff like a bellows, firing a cloud of ash in her hand directly into Capa's face!

The chalky debris invades the air around Capa's head, plastering his face with a grayish sheen. It settles into his eyes and burns salt-hot, forcing them closed! Tears well up against his eyelashes while his nostrils combust into tunnels of epidermal flame! Worst of all, every particle seems to wrench its way down Capa's throat and into his lungs, stealing the air from out of him like smoke in a burning building!

Though Capa knows none of this will kill him, the fear of death wells up from an old, forgotten place deep down inside. This is what Oni wanted - with death on the mind, he is sure to find his answers. His heart is pounding, screaming that it wants to stay alive! For all the choking, the strangling, the burning and the crying, Capa is in Hell; but he is not forsaken.

"Give in to de power, brother Capa." Oni's voice enters his ears and he can feel her bony hand working to calm him down, clamping on his shoulders and cradling his cheeks. He cannot see her for all of the tingling cerizas del muerte assaulting him, but he knows she is there, guiding him.

"Lay ye down, now, and sleeeeeeep..."

Her voice becomes more like a whisper. A pounding headache siezes Capa's brain and then, abruptly, its all black.

For several minutes, he is floating on a cloud somewhere high above the earth, where all is emptiness. The House of Black and the House of Light merge to form a timeless void curling through the Santeria priests fingers and toes.

A halo of bloody crimson burns against his eyelids. When it feels safe to open them again, Capa finds himself staring at a distant sun, too far away to give warmth or light - but these are things he has no need of. Not here, floating in the emptiness of a cosmic dream.

Not even the stars come out to greet him. Only one shimmering furnace hundreds, thousands, millions of miles away, and the gradual swell in his chest that tells him he is floating - no, falling - away from it, descending deep into an atmospheric cloud. Odd, impressionistic tufts reach up and cradle him like a mother's arms, forming bedsheets to hold him still. Shafts of light from the faraway sun take new form, coalescing into bedposts of solid gold.

Rest here, he can hear someone saying. It is kind. Orunmila? The pain vanishes, and a sea of comfort settles into Capa.

[Thee Independent]

Capa

Dead,
dying,
not yet dead,
hanging at the threshold, por aqui (through here)
Orunmila mira me ya (Orunmila Look on to me)
San Francisco que sera. (Saint Francis What will it be)
A dormir por aya (Sleeping over there)
Pajaro negro venga ya. (black bird come now)

Capa floats into slumber within San Francisco De Assisi's presence. It is time to rest and allow things to be.

TI

The weight of the universe bears down on the Priest, pressing him deep into the mist-moist mattress underneath him, a feeling of imagined gravity that seems to push from above rather than pull from below. For a smaller being, the weight might be too much to bear, but for Capa, it is light with Life, his own voice echoed back to him from on High. He can almost hear his invocation to the Saints, the one he uttered before Oni struck him dumb with the Death Ash, echoing faraway.

Even with his eyes closed in a restful wakeness, Capa can see through the thin flesh at the distant sun. But his eyes grow wider when, suddenly, it begins to shrink. The light and subtle heat diminish as it snuffs itself out. A round shadow, one of the celestial bodies, slides like a great blotting black lens over the great Sun.

When the warm light is gone, it is replaced by a cold, silvery pale. The Moon is gigantic in Capa's sky, so wide and so close that it brings on a feeling of shock. He gets the sense that the heavenly rock is leaning over him, scrutinizing with an expressionless white face.

But the size of the Moon! It feels near enough that it will surely destroy him in comparison. It is Great, but he is Small; a Man against Old Luna.

Clink clink.

On the edge of the golden bedpost, a King Raven bigger than Capa's head perches. Black talons scratch the cold, metal globe at the end of the bed.

"Caw-pa. Caw-pa."

Capa

"La Luna. What is this?

Shaking his head in an attempt to get his bearings Cap sits on the bed.

"Pajaro negro I need you to show me what disturbs Sid Berkowitz. The experience if it does not provide who or what it is may give me something else to go on. Olrunmila has blessed me with the power of sight and if you are the eramienta then come take flight and guide me" Capa looks to de bedposts examining them for a few seconds.

"Come on I am sure that you don't like to have secrets kept from you. You will know who it is that eludes you once I have my answers."

TI

The raven cocks its head at Capa, as if his impassioned words were unintelligible to the black bird. Inhumanly fast, the head twists to the right. One side-set eye stares at the Priest sitting up in his makeshift bed floating in the telosphere of time and space.

"Caw-pa!"

Crowing, the bird spreads its wings wide to take flight. But instead of flapping a fury of feathers into a gust to make it airborne, it perches just like that, with its head low and mouth open, like a ritual. The feathers ruffle in the back like a cat's fur, shining oily blue.

Then it is gone, tearing off the edge of the bed and flying upwards into the heart of the nighttime moon menacing Capa with its unbelieveable nearness. The raven remains a black spot for more than a minute, and then vanishes.

To his surprise, when Capa manages to stop staring at the hypnotic alabaster moon, he notices that the bedposts are not what they were before. They are still golden, but are no longer round spheres. What appear to be years of talon-scratches have pulled them into a strange symbol, distorted and warped out of perfection, resembling an impressionistic torch or stave or mathematical diagram. One line curls in an oval on the top, which rests on a horizontal bar, which in turn rests on a vertical bar.

Though Capa is not familiar with the symbol in his own practices, he does believe he recognizes it, and has seen it borne by a handful of strange western magicians he has seen in his life.

They call it an ankh.

Capa

Ankh the symbol for life eternal
Capa’s hand moves to grab the shaft of the cross. He grips it, the symbol of manhood, moving his hand in the direction of the cross section, this must represent the land, upwards to the circle, the womb where we all come from, ending at the top of the circle. It's here for a reason. Is this what keeps me bound to life? Still alive I need to thread with the dead.

Grasping the ankh as a handhold, he brings his body up to a kneeling position at the head of the bed. Climbing to his feet still grasping the ankh he takes a perch on the headboard.

Three figures move towards him one is on a horse, the other two walk ahead of him. The lead figure wears the yellow and white of Saint John. The one next to San Juan is dressed in red and black, Saint Anthony. The Caballero comes behind.

Capa brings the name of the one whose fate he seeks to his mind Sid Berkowitz and jumps as the black bird had.

The Knight and Saint Anthony move to his side while Saint John stays behind on the bed.

TI

Gravity stalls its power over Capa's weightless body, forcing him to hang suspended in the air overlooking a forest of cloud beneath him. The bed vanishes behind him, sinking into the moist white river, and one by one, it feels that each of his organs begins to rise towards his throat, beginning with his stomache. All of the contents of his body yearn to spill out through his mouth, succumbing to the need, the desire, the natural outcome of falling, but Capa's body remains locked in place.

Saint Anthony raises his right arm at Capa's left side. The Good Lord says that a kind word lifts the spirits. You are a selfless, tireless savior, Capa, and the Kingdom of Heaven will rejoice when you at last join that Holy Firmament. Take flight.

A ridge of white feathers spring out of Capa's sleeve as the fabric turns to mist and reforms. Instantly, he can feel a wind that he couldn't detect before tickling the underside of his arm, making him feel buoyant in the air. The sensation of suspended plummeting relaxes.

The Knight lifts a shield in the air with his left hand, the horse rearing at the Priest's right side. No soul is ever saved without a fight, without sacrifice. You may lose it all to gain something for another, and there is no greater Purpose than this. May Bravery steady your step, and Courage set your jaw. And above all, proceed with Honor for the man, Sid Berkowitz, who by virtue of age deserves every ounce of your Respect.

More feathers coalesce on Capa's right arm, and both arms extend. His fingers disappear in favor of rounded tips that feel like the perfect guides for an airborne journey. Suddenly, Capa feels protected from the danger of falling, and is soaring in one spot.

Saint John steps forward with a golden chalice in his hands. The shine of his robes is faintly reminiscent of the distant sun Capa had seen minutes ago. He dips two fingers into the chalice and waves his hand in one great cirle over the Dreamspeaker's head. Yea, Saint Juan annoints thee with Wisdom. Let all that you achieve be in God's name, and all that must be sacrificed be hallowed. We cannot guide you beyond this flight, for the Answers you seek are so deep within your Self that you must listen to that song alone, and not ours. God be with you, sacerdote."

Light olive oil slides down through Capa's hear, but when it reaches the bridge of his nose, begins to transform his face into an avian mask not unlike the haunting image of Sino's wrennish guise. A golden beak extends out from him, aerodynamic in every way, and he feels himself shrinking, becoming lighter, and giving his entire self to the Air, to the Dream.

Fly! his three accomplices say in unison. Seek.

Whoosh! A tempest of air buffets Capa's newfound wings and send him hurtling into the great, powerful face of the Moon. No matter how beautiful it is, glowing like a winter wonderland or a great silver coin before him, he cannot shake a sense of dread, an unreasoning mortal fear of its size in comparison to his own.

It seems too large for him to tackle, to conquer, let alone to approach. Far ahead of him, he can see the Raven soaring with a massive wingspan, dipping into the Luna's heart.

Capa

Humbly I accept your blessings and take them in my heart.

The large white dove flaps his wings to increase his speed and give chase to the raven. The moon looms in his sight and it sends a shiver of fear through Capa.

What mystery waits within the eternal woman.

Steadying his resolve Capa plunges into the heart of mystery. The white feathers shine under the beams of la Luna. Capa gains on the black feathered form and follows its path dipping with it to unknown reaches.

Come on Black Bird lead me to this illusive force which is beyond your reach. Answers must be found and I will be the tool.

TI

"Caw-pa!"

The wren's cry shears the sky apart! From somewhere over the uppermost reaches of the moon, a torrent of water begins to pour down slowly in an avalanche of rain spilt from an invisible cloud in the atmosphere. The distance seems somehow exaggerated; the flood could move for aeons before it ever reaches Capa and the Raven. This only serves to add an element of Time to the Distance around this massive body, and makes Capa feel ever smaller.

Suddenly, the Raven's wings tuck inwards and it begins diving towards the surface! And just as he does so, the entire lunar edge begins boiling with a ravaging tsunami closing in on the center, that point the Raven seems to be diving towards in a race to reach it before the water does.

Lightning crackles all around the White Bird Capa, lightning without any thunder, coming across like a warning to move faster, much faster, and to push his own limits to find the Answer.

Capa

One last flap for speed and tucking his wings in el pajaro blanco dives into the heart of Luna. The rain ever closer the wave of power closing the entrance to the paths of mystery. The blackbird reaches the lunar surface and does not seem to be stopping. Capa behind him sees that solid surface of the lunar landscape merely feet away.

No stopping, the waves will drown you if you do. The mythic size of the wave closing rapidly on the two birds grows with every inch that it moves towards them.

The white bird has moved to fly next to the raven. Capa's white form mirroring el pajaro negro. Side by side, they impact on the surface. For fractions of a second, everything is lost.

TI

For fractions of a second, everything is lost, including the expected impact with the dusty white surface. A phantom tremor quakes from Capa's crown down to his fan-tail; he knows more than feels his tiny neck breaking, his wings collapsing, his feathers molting from decay and endless passage of Time all around him. He has been shunted sideways outside the stream; even the giant waves of progress that once loomed on every horizon have spilled, washed over, and evaporated.

At last, Capa knows what it is like to be dead. It is to be completely outside in ways he never imagined possible.

The priest's eyes were long ago eaten out by ants, his ears filled with dirt. But he is aware of a single black feather resting in the palm of his lifeless hand - the only thing that remains of the Raven he pursued, or of the moon, or of anything.

Capa floats for an endless era.

He suffocates, though he no longer needs the air.

A flicker of Hope glimmers like a star in the distance. It is not meant for him. He is Lost, capsized in upon himself.

Were hours going by in the real world, where his body must be? Or did the old woman manage to kill him for good?

Capa is alone. And he keeps sinking into this Void.

Is he still dreaming?

He blinks his hollow eyes. Did a planet just die, then, when he blinked? He feels a flicker of life, and then a small rush around him, the only remnant of a lost civilization.

You say you have been chosen by the Saints, but what about your other concerns? An education? A family?

Sid Berkowitz! The old Jewish man had uttered those very words to Capa only a couple of hours ago. Or days. Or millenia. Their echo swims out of Capa's undying subconcious.

You charm an old lady, but youse a young man. Need a young woman, too.

Sweet Oni, always so kind and thoughtful towards the dedicated Dreamspeaker. The memory of her words bring a desire to forgive her, even if her death ash worked better than expected on him.

Suddenly, breath rushes back into Capa's lungs as two warm, soft arms begin massaging his back. An enormous pain, as though he had been shoulding the weight of the world, sears down his shoulders to his waist. But those her hands - a woman's hands - seem to relax the tension.

"¿este sentir bien, mi príncipe?" her voice echoes strangely in his ears. He still feels light as air. Where has he been taken now? What is he being shown? Who is this woman in his dreams?

Capa

"Querida?
"Mama?
"Qurandera?

"Abigail is that you? How long has it been querida? Mira, you see what happened to me? It's ok the man I did it for deserved to be helped. So old and with nothing to treasure. Que? Oh, who is it? Se Llama Sid Berkowitz. Yes un gringo, Judio. Como? Oh, no I'm fine the Saints be blessed. Yes I know you didn't believe lo que Doña Luz showed us. Pero mira it Real. Si, it's Real as the hill we slid down on palm tree shoots.

"No mama I'm not crazy. Que? Look I'm not worshiping Demons either. You will never believe me, verdad. Si, I ate today. Yes just like you thought me. Rinse the rice out in cold water till it runs clear, Water, Sal, y Oil. Si, con abichuelas. Como? No, still single an no kids. I know, I know yu wanted to have granchildrens. Perdon, but I was helping someone who needed it. Quien? Sid Berkowitz. Si un gringo. Yes because of Los Santos. Pero, it was me I wanted to help.

"Doña Luz? it's been a while. I know you want me to finish school. But Universidad had to wait. San Juan called me. Esqusas? No it's not an excuse. Yes I was helping someone. I know I went to far. Trust the Saints? Am I dead? Si la pluma I have it here, its all that left of el pajaro negro. The black bird takes the soul of the dead? But I'm here, I followed willingly. Ah yes Sid Berkowitz."

Power surges from Capa's form within the Darkness. The lone black feather becomes pregnant with power.

Concentrating on Sid’s Identity as one of Saint Anthony’s chosen, Capa allows the pull of the Oshira to guide him. A single strand of light trails from the distance up to Capa in the Void of death. The lone feather becomes an anchor for the strand of light.

‘Camina el camino babalao, (Walk in the path way, priest)
de aqui paya te lleva por el arrullo (from her to there it takes you through the stream)
del destino. (of destiny)
Entrando all valle (Entering the valley)
de la muerte, (of death)
no tengas miedo (fear not)
que tu Dios te bendise (That your God blesses you)
I sus Santos ban vailando (and his Saints go dancing)
A tu lado’ (next to you)

Capa recites an improvised prayer to the beat that drives within him. The fear of the unknown threatens to creeps into his heart. But the reminder of his Lord and purpose drives it away.

TI

Capa addresses Abigail through his stupor, and the soft, tender fingers on his back turn to kneading knuckles that slide down his spine like palm tree shoots. She does not answer, and he turns to Mama, who also says nothing in response. The hands, however, spread and strain his muscles with circular rotations, mingling his own sweat with an aromatic oil that reminds him of cooking rice. When he hopes that Dona Luz will call to him in his time of need, in this Void where he is Lost, she says nothing, but the hands put a warming pressure on his shoulders, reminding him that she is always there at his back, watching out for him and guiding him.

The wren's feather quakes in his hands; whether fearful or excited about the endless hole they are floating into, Capa cannot tell. Desparate, he invokes the Orisha through his own prayer. Upon speaking "destiny", the feather bristles in his hands, feeling sharp and unyielding rather than fluffy and malleable. When he says "death", it bursts into flames that write around his hands but do not singe the flesh.

"Fear not," another voice says in the distance simultaneously. All Capa can conentrate on is his prayer and the growing fire bursting from the black feather. It grows to the size of a tree, and he to the size of a mountain, containing a raging forest fire in his massive palms.

And then, in a flash, the fire merges with him and he erupts like a volcano, power bursting like molten lava and ash through his holy crown!

"Oh! Oh, Capa, mi amor, usted está sudando. ¡Usted soñaba!"

The feather is gone, and along with it Capa's feeling of weightlessness and nearness to death. Only the heat remains, the heat of a fever; no, of a sultry night in Chile in the lee of the mountains, where the humid jungles bear down all around him.

Opening his eyes, Capa can hardly see anything for the darkness. It is not the same kind of darkness that he was trapped in before. It is only the absence of the sun. The tiniest bit of moonlight gives a shape to the room he finds himself in, a bungalow made of wood. He can smell the humidity in the air, sweet fruits underlined with the reek of goat and chicken droppings. Crickets and frogs compose a natural symphony outside, and nightbird divas and swooping loons sing entrancing melodies that remind him, if only loosely, of home.

Warm bedsheets are wrapped around his body, and a woman's hot breath dampens his cheek. "Mi marido, are you well? A nightmare? You fall asleep while I ease your pain. Almost wake the baby with your shout."

A faint echo of Sid Berkowitz asking him once more about his family reverberates in his mind along with this woman's voice. She is no stranger to him, even though he does not know her name. She is his wife, and the mother of his child; but when did he get married and move down to the deep heart of South America? What of the Orisha, of Los Angeles and Sino?

What of Sid Berkowitz?

"Capa?" she asks, leaning closer and waiting for some response. Strands of ebony hair dangle in front of his face as he lies on his stomache in this hideaway home.

Capa

Capa sits up in his bed the weight of the years bear down on him.
"Preciosa, I'm ok, No it's not a nightmare. Did I ever tell you about Oni? I think something that I did in Los Angeles has finally come to fruition.

"The Orisha have sent me here to learn. You know? And I hope that I have shared my past enough with you so that you can retell me a few things.

"I am not the Capa you know at the moment. I am Capa from before we met and I hope to return to my self once I learn what I need to know. Dose it sound crazy to you.

"Where's the baby? I would like to see?"

He gives her his usual crooked smile. His head now feels lighter with his hair cropped close to his skull. The shoulder length mop of hair that he kept tied back, now gone.

TI

"Of course you have, silly man. Oni introduced us," the dusky woman's voice chides Capa lovingly. Her fingers run through Capa's short hair, scratching soothingly at his scalp. "Your hair, it was so long then. You were having nightmares. Still are, I think," she adds, blithely passing over his strange questions about the past and the present. To this strange woman, whom even up close Capa cannot make out in the dark, nothing is out of the ordinary.

"El bebé está durmiendo," she says, putting a finger to Capa's mouth. "Let her sleep. I just woke up and fed her and put her back in the crib. Her crying did not wake you, but these bad dreams did," she consoles, wrapping her soft arms around Capa's neck. A tingle goes down his spine, and he suddenly realizes that she is nibbling gently on the lobe of his ear. "You need the good sleep. We have not been together since the baby came. I want you," she whispers, pulling back and resting on her forelegs above Capa's waist. He can hear the barely detectable swish of a slip being drawn from her shoulders.

Moonlight bounces off of beautiful white teeth in their shadowed bungalow. Mingled in with the tropical, moist scent of the outside world, bustling with life, Capa can smell her; the cocoa skin, fresh breath, and the hot, sultry pheremones of a woman's desire.

How strange it seems to Capa, that he should be brought to this, what he thinks - what he hopes - to be a future time in his own life. Is Death so powerful that its influence transcends even Time? Or has Oni's dream powder brought him to some place so deep inside of himself that he can no longer tell what is real and what is make-believe? Sid and Oni's words about family, about love, and Capa's own locked away desires for this very kind of companionship churn together in his heart and his mind.

Capa

"Negra not right now. You got to wait a few hours or minutes to have me. I told you that I'm not the Capa of the Now." He flips out of the bed and lands on his knees on the floor. "I have to remain pure right now to do my work. Now tell me what happened to the old man Sid Berkowitz. What happened back in Los Angeles." The expression on his face, if she could see it, would tell her that he is serious about this. She will have to wait no matter how tempting it is for him to just let it happen. It's taking everything I got to resist this. Oni you sure don't make things easy.

TI

“Capa, dear,” she slides in to his side, compassionate and caring, laying a hand on his arm. “You are so worried. You are not yourself. Maybe,” she trails off, “maybe you are having the posesión again.”

Laying her silky head against Capa’s, her face still shrouded in shadow, the woman speaks in a husky yet submissive voice laced with trepidation. “Sid Berkowitz was a viejo you knew in California. I remember his name from when I found a star you had, a Hebrew star, and you said that he had been a good friend before passing on to the next world.”

He can hear her warm, wet mouth swallow audibly before continuing. “Then you say nothing more, and I ask nothing more. You smiled a little, I remember, but were sad. I do not know why, Capa, I am sorry. You have never told me.” She puts an index finger to his lips. “By choice, I think. There was something about it, maybe, you could not share. Are you now dreaming of that story, that past? Lost elsewhere? Come, Capa, come see the bebe. Hold her. She will remind you of where you are, I know.”

Tugging on his arm, she rises from the bed and escorts him across the creaking wooden floor of the bungalow to a screen door at the edge of their bedroom. Capa can make out the flecks of moons and stars painted on the edge of a homemade crib of dried sugarcane. A tiny bundle of baby blue blankets lies in the bottom of the crib.

“There, dear. There she is…our bebe.”

Capa

The damp air scented by the night-blooming flowers gives Capa a sense of grounding. This is home for his family. Capa follows his wife into the room. The crib is a dark outline with glowing highlights from the moonlight filtering into the room. A moth flutters at the screened-in-window, the buzz of mosquitoes vibrates under the sound of their breathing. An orchestra of sound explodes outside, insects, birds and animals can be heard by Capa. Every step he takes towards crib seems to solidify his surroundings. Everything will workout as long as I do my part.

Reaching the crib, he looks inside at the small bundle. Then looking to his wife. "Can I pick her up." With his wife's approval, he reaches in, picking the tiny mound of sheets. He brings it towards him unsure how to hold it. Finally, he rests it against his chest. Slowly raises the blanket revealing her face.

[Thee Independent]

TI

Everything will work out as long as I do my part.

Everything about this outlandish dream world could be Capa’s future; it could work out this way, as long as he does his part, makes the right choices and does the right things. Happiness is just around the bend, just a number of years away.

More years than some people, like Sid Berkowitz, have. Where is his happiness?

Suddenly, the world comes into sharp focus for Capa and ceases to feel like a dream. Of the few Ecstatics he has met in the past who have waxed philosophical over peyote or marijuana about the intense Oneness with Time and Self, none could have described it so eloquently as Capa experiences it now. The weight of this baby in his arms is real, and so is her breathing. Never-before-experienced memories seep into his conciousness: a plane ticket, a man in white paint, a dark man with a hat and strange amber eyes, and most passionately felt, this baby’s conception on the banks of a misty river in the lee of a Chilean mountain.

Seconds slow down and move like molasses as Capa pulls the blanket back to reveal the face of his Future. Excitement buzzes up inside of him at seeing the fruit of his own loins; a fruit that suddenly begins to rot in the tiny blue blanket. The buzzing inside of him becomes a buzzing outside of him, like thousands of flies swarming around their bungalow. The edges of his vision flicker and warp, seeming like flowing, milky black water, a primordial ocean swimming all around him.

The baby’s serpentine eyes stare up at Capa with cold and violent impassivity before the brownish face distends into a set of snapping, scaled jaws! The shadow woman’s shriek is shrill, then echoing, then distant as the snake’s fangs skewer Capa’s left breast, directly over his heart! His own blood gushes out, and the baby viper, like a gorgon monster out of myth, suckles the syrupy nourishment in gut-busting gulps, drinking Capa’s very life away!

The pain is intense, but the feeling of loss and disappointment are stronger; this amazing dream stricken by a terrible fate, a prophetic nightmare. The venom courses through the Dreamspeaker’s veins, choking out every piece of his surroundings; the jungle, the bungalow, the insects, the woman, the crib, the serpent swaddled in blue blankets. Its fangs remain poised over his heart for a second more and then vanish, leaving Capa in the same black void he awoke from.

The acrid scent of that terrible death ash Oni breathed into his face burns poignantly. The pain of the aching wound in his chest and the withering poison distending all of his mucles are, ironically, the only things that he feels are keeping him alive. Without this incredible pain, he would not have the strength to avoid letting go…

Capa

The searing swelling cause by the poison spreads through Capa.Your still dead loco. No time travel but prophetic visions. The Saints gave me their blessings. But the loss hurts none the less. Get a hold of the feel of the painted man fallow, the spiritual fate be your own guide. No seas egoístico your baby was a dream. Get over it. Your people need you to pull through. Capa follows the pull of the fate connected to the painted man. He controls the pain knowing that it's his one anchor. He slowly neutralizes the toxin with Saint John's Blessing.

Now fly again Paloma balnca(White dove). Follow Sino's path, El Destino.

TI

"...40 ccs...check the vitals..."

Disembodied voices haunt Capa's afterlife, tumbling down through the black void like his own body, or the dust from the strange painted man in his mind's eye. His arms, feeling the loss of the baby, can only cradle his own body. He struggles against a catatonia, trying to conjure up those snowy feathers again, and be as the white dove in pursuit of the Sino-like raven. But his body refuses to respond to his desperate thoughts. The toxin is burning in his body, succuming far too slowly to Saint John's invisible healing touch.

Capa tumbles head over heels in this black womb, and as he spins over, that distant sun is visible again, its light trying to travel billions of miles to reach him, to warm him. And to warn him.

A feathery black shadow obscures the sun in a windy, flapping whoosh. Between himself and the sun, a black shadow - the elusive wren - is no longer flying away from him, but growing and lunging across the galaxy towards him with frightening speed.

"...respiratory paralysis!..."

Caw-pa! Caw-pa!

Fate's shrill cry pierces the universe.

Capa

Capa's body trembles from the pain caused by the poison. He know that he can move through it. But the emotional loss still drains him. As he sees the Raven Capa extends his body.

The Ravens claws strike down with the skill of a hunter and grab Capa by his shoulders. They dig down deep causing blood to spill out of where it sunk its claws into him. "It's your time babalao. Give yourself unto Fate."

The passion wells up deep inside him. The knowledge of the ancients fuels Capa's burn to reach his destination. "SiNo does not command me Pajaro Negro (Black Bird). I am the one who commands Fate like El Caballero (The Knight). NOW FLY FATE AND TAKE ME WHERE YOU MAY NOT REACH ON YOUR OWN. TAKE US TO THE POWER THAT ELUDES YOU. SHOW ME HOW THEY AFFECT SID BERKOWITZ. BY THE WILL OF OLODUMARE, AND THE ORISHAS I COMAND YOU.

TI

Digging its comet-tipped talons into Capa's back, the gargantuan raven crows loudly and sweeps him from his lazy float down the black river of space. A sensation of vertigo overwhelms Capa's stomach as the universe turns, and when he can open his eyes again, he can see that faraway star growing brighter and brighter by the second! Bidden by his command, the black bird carries him farther away from the endless void and closer to something...Capa digs deep into his senses, fighting with sheer will against the confusion of this strange place, the Valley of Death, to find the one key element of Destiny that can remain untouched even by fate.

"...may need a tracheotomy..."

A tornado whirl of black feathers arcs in the searing wind tunnel left behind in Capa and his carrier's trail. They form a trail that leads out into the darkness that the Santeria Priest is departing; strangely, the indigo glow common to raven feathers is replaced by a scintillating green, like serpent scales.

Capa continues to stare, confident that by exerting some serious control over his perception he can finally find an answer to his question: show me what fate affects Sid Berkowitz!

The feather begin to turn green, forming a fluttering sea of green shapes flapping over and over again in the darkness. A shape moves beneath them, swishing back and forth like creeping tentacles or a drowning man's limbs. As the sun looms nearer behind Capa, the image gets harder to see. The Raven is set and determined on this course, and its cry sounds almost pleading to Capa's ears.

But the message! It still isn't clear! He needs more time, and as strange as it sounds, there is the sense that time is swiftly becoming a commodity.

"Notify next of kin..."

Capa

“Oh San Patricio is this your child. Damballa y Wedo protect me form your child for I must see what it want.” Capa holds the path of SiNo on course. “This way is knowledge." But time seems to be against him. "What is it? The operation someone is dying and I fear that it’s Sid.” Ghost memories or fragments of the future haunt Capa. "Death comes to fast but learn to accept the path of Fate."

“Un Bababalao viene. SiNo can’t go farther for it is against its place in things” Capa looks for the signs that he needs, things become jarred fractured and incomprehensible. “Ahi vamos La muerte of me” Capa must find the path before SiNo is barred. “Echisero of Snakes Green like the life” his thoughts are becoming lost. To close to the end Move onward. “SiNo let me go for you may not go further” Poison flows in his essence marking him as a victim of Snake. But a Victim who is no longer a threat. “Snake has no need to fear me for I am dead, I will go to Snake now SiNo. Return for your prize if I’m wrong. For I will go con Dulces the Menta”

Capa reaches for his things the pain of poison and claws make him believe he still has his possessions and here in the land of Essence Belief rules all. “Bon Bon de Menta and thank you great bird”

TI

Caw-pa!

The Sino-Bird crows loudly, tightening its death grip upon Capa's aching body. Below them the emerald ocean swirls and spins like a violent stormswept sea, with scintillating waves of green crashing into one another and cascading through the cosmos. In spite of Capa's pleading, the bird is reluctant to let him go.

The light of the sun grows closer. Searing solar flares lick hungrily at the back of Capa's scalp; he can feel the heat rising in his skin like a mean temper or the fluid burn of an IV drip. Something sputters in the sea below.

Caw-pa!

More feathers fall, turning green almost instantly after leaving the giant raven's body. Soon they storm in a whirlwind all around Capa, and he can see imprintations upon them: famous American presidents and US capitol buildings. Dollar bills! Fives and tens and twenties and hundreds! Greenbacks scatter on the solar winds, tumbling end over end and falling into the sea of Scrooge's weakness. And still something frighteningly real swims beneath the surface, thrashing and growing dangerously close.

Capa tries to stare; this is the message he's been asking the Orisha for! But in what form does it come? Even to his own ears, his prayers sound empty, floating out onto into the lifeless Void where only he and the Sino-creature fly. Dollar bills closest to his head begin bursting into flame! The heat is growing so intense! Capa can even feel himself sweating.

Caw-pa!

Larger than the moon that bore down upon him, and more menacing than the raging stellar inferno exploding at his back, a mountain of green money bubbles out of the sea like a volcano! Or a tentacled limb, grasping for Capa...

Caw-pa!

The bird ducks its head and flies faster, making a suicide run for the heart of the sun, the only source of light in this terrible universe!

Caw-pa!

Feathers roast in mid-air, turning to a gray, stinging, floating ash that Capa is all too familiar with. It fills his nostrils and burns. It threatens to burn his eyes, but he keeps his gaze focused clearly on the trail of feathers leading into the grasping cash mountain. Water tears up at the corners, but his sight remains clear; maybe the Orisha have heard his prayer.

Caw-pa! See!

The volcano erupts, and out of the boiling summit rises the face of none other than Sid Berkowitz! His body is naked, his eyes bulging, and he clutches at his throat with one hand, treading the treacherous sea of dollar bills with the other! Lurching sea serpents with $100 scales slither over his legs and pull him under, and he is gone for a moment before bobbing to the surface again, gasping for air! Sid Berkowitz is dying! Drowning! And Capa, in the clutches of his mad bird rushing for the heavens, is powerless to help him!

Capa. Sid extends a futile hand towards the fading Capa, grasping for his aid, his help, and yet the poison in his Savior's veins is so great that it has paralyzed all but his sight! Gagging and coughing, Sid wrenches his head back, eyes squeezed shut, and vomits a plume of money into the air, which instead of breaking apart and diving back into the swamp, curls in upon itself and with horrifying ferocity, flies like an arrow across the empty expanse towards Capa and the Sino-Raven.

See! No!

Again, the wren shrieks and tightens its grip on Capa, flapping its molting wings desperately to get away! Hissing, the plume of dollars coalesces into a raging drake, with cold, lifeless swirling penny eyes that stare at its prey! A voracious mouth opens in the front, set to swallow Capa and his feathered bearer; silver dollars warp into barbed fangs three light years long!

And then, before he knows it, Capa is pitched out of the Raven's talons, hurtling head over heels the rest of the way towards the sun. The great bird spins about just as the serpent closes in, and its rich fangs sink deep into the Raven's breast. The beak opens in a shriek, but all Capa can hear is the roar of the whole sun behind, burning his clothes, his hair, his flesh.

He spins over, and is blinded by the light of the sun.

He spins back around the other way, and sees the Sino-bird falling through the void in the mouth of the money-snake.

He spins over again. The light of the sun is so bright, it melts his eyes. The searing goo drips back into his skull and smothers his brain, boiling it in a stew of cranial fluid...

The Santeria priest's body stirs beneath the medic's scalpel. A guttural growl rises slowly out through his nostrils and out of the oxygen mask strapped tightly to his mouth.

"Hold! The boy breathes! I tell you he must breathe! No need to cut, see?"

Fired like a slingshot from his long and terrible trip, Capa's body lurches upwards abruptly in the clinic bed! The scalpel-wielding medic stumbles backwards, surprised at the force of the patient's rise, and collapses on silver instrument table which falls to the floor with a deafening clamor!

Capa's eyes are burning; all he can see is the tiniest bit beam of sunlight filtering through a set of gray venetian blinds on the window to his left. But somehow the light feels magnified, and it sears and burns his eyes until he is forced to close them or go blind! His body, then, strangely unresponsive, falls back into the sterile, rough linens on the medical bed.

"Vitals are up," a nurse calls from his left, her voice underscored by an electronic bleeping. "Pat, are you ok?"

"Fine, I'm fine!" the medic says, scrambling to his feet. Loafers squeal against the cold floor. "Thank God. Look, he's breathing on his own." There is a silence, and though Capa can hear their voices, his throat is dry and stuffed with cotton. He breathes involunatrily, but hasn't the stamina to speak or to move. Only to listen. "And I was...God, I was just about to give him a tracheotomy."

"What Oni tell you?" a familiar voice rasps to Capa's right, seeming to lean over his body as it goes on. Leathery hands seek out his hand beneath the sheets and clasp it, holding onto him as tightly as the Raven had. "Modern doctors. Give no credit to the Oni way. If you cut his throat and den he start chokin' on blood, you be hearin' from me, yes. And lawyer, too! Hmph."

Pat the medic sighs. These are the kind of whackaloons you commonly deal with at a public health clinic. All of the sane people have insurance and can afford to go to a hospital. Everyone else comes here and nearly dies right in his hands: gunshot wounds, stabbings, vehicular manslaughter cases. A snakebite like this guy was rare. "The antivenom is finally doing its job, then. Took them long enough to get it here. We had to contact the animal services department and have them send it. Speaking of that, do you want them to send somebody out to your place to find the snake that bit him?"

Oni's voice crows proudly. "No, no, no. I take care of him, you bet. No worries." A hand falls onto Capa's head. "Brother Capa...you hear me? Squeeze me hand if you do..."

Capa

Power less from the poison running through his system Capa accepts his fate. The same Fate which in a moment of desperation he though he was the master of. The sun begins to boils his essence as his spiritual being is pull towards it.

The shock of the heat forces the strand to throw his disembodied essence back into his shell. Yet the poison burns he feels nothing but pain as his body flops back onto hospital stretcher. On the collapsed stretcher, he moans out "Damballa y Wedo, Sid". All he can still think of is the Saint of Snakes. He remains delirious from the poison burning in him.

Oni Silently Capa Squeezes her hand with the little strength left in him. Time is running and he must heal. He is powerless to find his herbs, The healing arts are very difficult to attempt with out them.

In his condition, Capa can't even hope to reach his prayer necklace. With it he could call on Saint John for a healing blessing. He can only hope that this is truly the end of his voyage into the realm of death and that Saint John is close by.

TI

No sooner does Capa squeeze Oni's hand than her grip tightens on him, stroking his wrist in a gentle, motherly way. "Oh, Capa...the ash, it show you for sure," she whispers, and goes quiet as the physician begins to speak. The burning sensation remains in Capa's body, but a dull numbness swills inside of him, quickly lessening the pain and making him more aware of his surroundings, if not completely able to interact with them as he would like.

"He's concious, but weak. The morphine is still active in his system, so he's going to be sleeping here most of the day. I know, but we had to use a painkiller to stop the muscular convulsion. He'll pull through, but just watch him to make sure the antivenom breaks the toxins down," Pat tells the clinic nurse, who nods and writes the details down on the patient's record.

"Mister, ah...just Capa?" he whispers to the nurse, who shrugs and nods. "Yes, Capa, my name is Patrick O'Callaghan. You don't have to open your eyes or speak to me, just listen. I'm a physician at the Sherwood Clinic; you were brought here at five in the morning to be treated for a snakebite. Oni called us and told us you'd been bitten while you were asleep. You are going to be just fine, Capa, but you need plenty of rest and the nurses are going to monitor your condition to make sure the antivenom stabilizes the shock to your system. According to Oni's description, we believe the snake was an elapid, a specie of coral snake common to this region, so we used a matching antivenom and it is working."

"Ptuh," Oni makes a sound. "Dat thing waren't no eee-lah-pid. It came inna your bed while you Seek, while Oni sleep nearby. It came to bite you," she cautions ominously.

Pat clears his throat and interrupts. "Whatever the reason, you've now been treated and you'll be ok. You can probably feel the morphine working now. Don't fight it, Capa, just rest. With luck, you can leave here tomorrow, or the next day if your fluid levels are still low. We stay open all night, since we're inner city. If there's anyone you want for us to contact, any family or friends, tell the nurse as soon as you're able. We'll do what we can for you. If you need help of any kind, just press the red button in your left hand," his voice says soothingly, and Capa feels a tugging on something planted in his left palm.

Pat's words echo slightly, replaying again and again in Capa's head as the chemical drowsiness descends. He can tell that Pat and the nurse leave. Only Oni stays behind. Her homemade jewelry clicks and clatters comfortably as she leans over to whisper in his ear. Her hand is warm on his forehead.

"De ceniza del muerte hep you See, it did? De Answer be here now in ya mind, Brother Capa, an' you keep it to yawsef. Oni hear you cry for de Orisha, coo like a dove an' talk to a loved one she don't know nothin' bout. Den you quiet and happy, 'til dat devil snake bite. Oni find it under de sheets, coiled on your chest where it strike you. I grab it and crush its beady head, and soon I skin it to make an opele belt for you."

Oni seems more and more distant as a comfortable, non-prophetic slumber weighs as heavily down upon Capa as the whole moon. The early morning sunlight slips through the blinds and seems less menacing to his eyes as the morphine takes effect.

"Sleep, mi bebé, sleep, hm? Oni watch over you and take care. Oni find someone to hep you get better real soon, so you not have to stay here, so you can go save dat viejo's soul..."

Capa

Morphine flows through the veins of Capa. Numbing the burning from the poison. It also numbs his senses and mind. He hears the words of the Doctor from far away. He knows the pain of careering for a community that seems to not want to help itself. The burden they both carry are equal and the Doctor lives with the threat of personal ruin if one of his decisions is the wrong one.

Sunrays spark a candle in Capa’s head. It’s morning, or afternoon. The voice speaks of a snakebite. Memories of the pain return. Followed by the knowledge of the sacrifices that someone made for him. No. Not someone, something. The morphine induced haze threatens to pull him into the void of empty sleep.

“No hay Tiempo” Time is such a great commodity. Time, moving in a Stream towards it's destination, destiny, Fate, el SiNo. Another Spark, synapses attempt to process the information.

A snake, Sino, scarifies,…

Oni speaks “save dat viejo’s soul”

…the Sun burst in his mind's eye, brighter than white, indescribable in intensity. A debt must be honored. And a soul is at stake.

Revuelve me Fuersa (Strength return to me)

Capa’s Hand moves to the yellow and white beads of his Saint. He draws strength form their contact with his skin.

[Spanish] "Oh, San Juan give me Strength" [Spanish]

With a jolt of vigor Capa sits on the Hospital Stretcher “Where my tools?”


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