Hurricane Dancers Read online

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  In memory of my Cuban Indian ancestors

  Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.

  Caliban

  from The Tempest by William Shakespeare

  Bernardino de Talavera was deeply in debt, like so many Spaniards who worked their Indians to death, yet could not prosper. He assembled a group of seventy characters in rags for debts and other unpunished crimes, and together they stole a ship.…

  Bartolomé de las Casas

  Historia de las Indias

  HISTORICAL SETTING

  Spanish ships reached the western Caribbean Sea in 1492, searching for Asia and spices. Instead, the explorers found peaceful islanders, and enslaved them.

  By 1510, the Bahamas, Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, and Jamaica had been conquered. Only Cuba, the largest Caribbean isle, was still free.

  It was a time of hurricanes on an island of hope.

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Quebrado (keh-BRAH-doe): A young ship’s slave of Taíno Indian and Spanish ancestry

  Bernardino de Talavera

  (ber-nar-DEE-no deh tah-lah-VEH-rah): The first pirate of the Caribbean Sea

  Alonso de Ojeda (ah-LON-so de oh-HEH-dah): The pirate’s hostage, a brutal conquistador

  Naridó (nah-ree-DOE): A young Ciboney Indian fisherman

  Caucubú (kow-koo-BOO): The young daughter of a Ciboney chieftain

  Caciques (kah-SEE-kehs): Chieftains

  Behiques (beh-EE-kehs): Shamans

  Ciboney and Taíno Indian tribesmen, women, and children

  Spanish sailors

  Spirits

  Ghosts

  Part One

  Wild Sea

  Quebrado

  I listen

  to the song

  of creaking planks,

  the roll and sway

  of clouds in sky,

  wild music

  and thunder,

  the groans

  of wood,

  a mourning moan

  as this old ship

  remembers

  her true self,

  her tree self,

  rooted

  and growing,

  alive,

  on shore.

  Quebrado

  One glance is enough to show me

  the pirate’s mood.

  There are days when he treats me

  like an invisible wisp of night,

  and days when he crushes me

  like a cockroach on his table.

  I try to slip away

  each time I see

  his coiled fist,

  even though

  on a ship

  there is no place

  to hide.

  Quebrado

  The sailors call me el quebrado,

  “the broken one,” a child of two

  shattered worlds, half islander

  and half outsider.

  My mother was a natural, a “native”

  of the island called cu ba, “Big Friend,”

  home of my first few wild

  hurricane seasons.

  My father was a man of the sea,

  a Spanish army deserter.

  When my mother’s people

  found him on horseback,

  starving in the forest,

  they fed him, and taught him

  how to live like a natural.

  To become a peaceful Taíno,

  he traded his soldier-name

  for Gua Iro, “Land Man.”

  He and my mother

  were happy together,

  until a plague took the village,

  and none were left

  but my wandering father,

  who roamed far away,

  leaving me alone

  with his copper-hued horse

  in an unnatural village

  of bat-winged spirits

  and guava-eating ghosts.

  Sailors call me a boy

  of broken dreams,

  but I think of myself

  as a place—a strange place

  dreamed by the sea,

  belonging nowhere,

  half floating island

  and half

  wandering wind.

  Quebrado

  I survived alone in the ghostly village,

  with only my father’s abandoned horse

  to console me, until a moonlit night

  when I was seized by rough seafarers,

  wild men who beat me

  and taught me how to sail,

  and how to lose hope.

  I was traded from ship to ship as a slave,

  until I ended up in the service

  of Bernardino de Talavera,

  the pirate captain of this stolen vessel.

  The pirate finds me useful

  because I know two tongues,

  my mother’s flutelike Taíno,

  and my father’s drumlike Spanish.

  Together, my two languages

  sound like music.

  Quebrado

  How can a father abandon a son

  in such a dangerous world?

  Why did he leave me alone

  in that village of ghosts

  with only his red horse

  for company?

  What kind of horseman

  abandons his steed?

  A sorrowful man,

  that is the answer.

  I have spent all my years

  accepting sad truths.

  Bernardino de Talavera

  I once owned a vast land grant

  with hundreds of naturales,

  Indian slaves who perished

  from toil, hunger, and plagues.

  Crops withered, mines failed.

  All my dreams of wealth vanished.

  Soldiers soon gave chase,

  trying to send me to debtors’ prison,

  so I captured this ship and seized

  a valuable hostage, Alonso de Ojeda,

  Governor of Venezuela,

  an immense, jungled province

  on the South American mainland,

  where he is known

  as the most ruthless

  conqueror of tribes.

  When I heard that Ojeda

  had been wounded by a warrior’s

  frog-poisoned arrow,

  I offered help, assuring the Governor

  that my ship would gladly carry him

  to any port with Spanish doctors.

  I offered the illusion of mercy,

  and Ojeda was desperate enough

  to believe me.

  Quebrado

  The pirate demands a ransom,

  but the hostage insists

  he has nothing to give,

  so while they argue,

  I lean over the creaking ship’s

  splintered rail,

  watching with wonder

&nb
sp; as blue dolphins

  leap and soar

  like winged spirits.

  My mother believed dolphins

  can change their shape, turning

  into men who come ashore

  to sing and dance during storms.

  If legless creatures

  can be transformed,

  maybe someday

  I will change too.

  Bernardino de Talavera

  I catch the broken boy,

  and it takes only a few quick blows

  to convince Ojeda

  of my strength.

  When the prisoner sees my power

  over a slave boy, he understands

  that I would show even less mercy

  to a grown man.

  Knights who have lost

  their guns and swords

  are remarkably easy

  to frighten.

  Alonso de Ojeda

  All my life, I have been triumphant.

  On the isle of Hispaniola, I tricked

  a chieftain by offering him a ride on my horse,

  then trapping him in handcuffs.

  I sent him away in the hold of a ship,

  to be sold as a curiosity in Spain,

  but a hurricane sank the vessel

  while the chief was still shackled.

  Expecting rebellion, I slaughtered

  his queen and all her people,

  to keep them from seeking revenge.

  There were days when my sword

  killed ten thousand.

  Now, all those dead spirits haunt me,

  and I am the one on a ship

  in chains.

  Quebrado

  The life of a ship’s slave

  is hard labor and fists,

  or deep water and sharks.

  When I sleep, I belong to the land.

  In dreams, I work in a field,

  planting roots in rich soil.

  In dreams, I feel like a spirit of the air,

  riding my father’s leaping horse.

  In dreams, I feel free,

  until the sun rises and my eyes open,

  and once again I must struggle

  beneath the weight

  of flapping sails

  and heavy ropes.

  Quebrado

  My mother loved the green parrots

  and red macaws that made the sky

  above our village look so cheerful.

  She always had at least one raucous bird

  perched on her shoulder.

  As if by magic, the clever birds

  learned to speak two languages.

  My first words of Taíno and Spanish

  were mastered by listening to songs

  recited by feathered creatures

  of the air.

  Now, each time I think of home,

  I remember that the world

  is big enough to offer more

  than sorrow.

  Quebrado

  The sea is wild today.

  The sails look like wings.

  Sailors chant tales while they work—

  sweet songs about the Island of Mermaids,

  and scary ones about the Isle of Giants,

  with green jungles where huge women

  turn into monsters, clasping sailors

  in their talons.

  The sea is wild tonight.

  The roaring wind

  sounds hungry.

  Alonso de Ojeda

  Shackled to a rotting wall

  in the ship’s stinking hold,

  I feel as helpless as a turtle

  flipped on its back,

  awaiting the cook’s

  probing knife.

  I clench my fists

  and struggle

  to fight my way

  out of the handcuffs,

  while ghosts

  gather around me,

  watching

  and waiting.…

  Bernardino de Talavera

  The hostage begs for mercy,

  but I have enough trouble

  just trying to figure out

  how to steer

  the stubborn ship

  in this devil wind,

  and how to reach land,

  and where to await

  fair weather.

  In a storm, the only decision

  that really matters

  is direction.

  Quebrado

  The sky is alive with cloud dragons

  and wind spirits.

  When a sailor is almost swept overboard,

  I wish that I had a gold ring in my ear,

  like the one the pirate wears for luck.

  His red shirt is meant to ward away

  evil winds, and he ties a green cloth

  around his head for protection.

  The rest of us are dressed in rags,

  except for the shackled hostage,

  who wears armor and an amulet

  with the painted face of a wistful saint.

  I wonder if the saint looks so sad

  because she knows how many people

  Ojeda has killed.

  Quebrado

  I carry a brass bell

  that clangs

  with each step,

  hoping to soothe

  the angry wind

  by ringing out

  a festive melody.

  If only my own

  rising fear

  of this howling storm

  and the pirate’s fury

  and Ojeda’s screams

  could be calmed

  by a remedy

  as simple

  as music.

  Alonso de Ojeda

  I am a short man, but strong and agile.

  I was daring enough to lead

  the bold expedition that named

  this entire New World.

  Amerigo Vespucci was just a merchant

  on one of my ships, and even though

  the foolish mapmaker chose his name

  instead of mine, the true honor

  of claiming this vast wilderness

  still rightfully belongs to me.

  Someday, all maps and charts

  will proclaim the Alonsos,

  not the Americas!

  Quebrado

  The ship groans,

  wind shrieks,

  and I feel the storm

  breathing

  all around me

  like an enormous

  creature

  in a nightmare

  where beasts

  growl

  and chase.…

  On a ship

  there is no place

  to run away.

  Bernardino de Talavera

  I am not a man of prayer,

  but every hurricane earns its name

  by falling on the feast day

  of a saint who has the power

  to calm wild winds

  and spare fragile ships,

  so even though I have no calendar,

  and I am just guessing at today’s date,

  I roar the name of Santiago,

  patron of my homeland,

  Spain’s armored warrior-saint,

  galloping on his ghostly

  white stallion

  of clouds.…

  Quebrado

  Brigantines are slow ships,

  sailing no more than five knots,

  a mere crawl in the face

  of hurricane winds.

  The foremast is square-rigged

  and massive like a thundercloud,

  and the aft mast is rounded

  like a graceful bird’s wing,

  but the pirate is not a real captain.

  He’s merely a failed farmer,

  unable to steer accurately

  in such a fierce gale.

  Sailors cry out for help

  from the only skilled mariner

  on this vessel—the hostage.

  Shou
ld we free him?

  Can he save us?

  Quebrado

  The sky is a fiery waterfall.

  Rain and lightning pummel the deck

  from above, while giant waves

  hurl us from side to side,

  and fierce currents tug

  from below.

  Every force of nature grasps

  at shards of worm-eaten

  ship’s wood.

  While sailors call out

  in anguish,

  I cling to the rail,

  expecting

  to die.

  Bernardino de Talavera

  A good sailor should be able to smell

  the spice of land while a ship is still far

  from shore, so I sniff the wild air,

  hoping for ginger, vanilla, and orchids,

  but all I inhale is sulfur—lightning—

  the storm dragon’s breath,

  a zigzag flame.

  There is no terror greater

  than the danger of fire on a ship.

  With sailors demanding that the hostage

  be set free to help steer,

  I relent.

  Even the worst enemies

  can seem like friends

  when storm winds

  unite us.

  Quebrado

  The iron key

  feels like a wing

  in my hand

  as it floats down

  toward shackles

  to save the life

  of a captive,

  even though

  I know he is

  a killer

  who would never

  free me.

  Alonso de Ojeda

  Murky waters rise,

  flooding the hold

  so that I barely

  escape.

  I used to be powerful,

  but now I am useless,

  so weak that I have to lean

  on the slave boy’s

  bony shoulder.

  I limp up the ladder,

  out of watery darkness,

  into a fiery storm.

  Quebrado

  Burning masts

  plummet and crash,