Charles Haddox, St. Anthony’s Bazaar

The rain falls with a full sack: September of ripe amaranth, shorter days and violent skies, under the stars in a cloud’s rattle, the wary smile of the cat-faced moon, and the moment itself as the form of the fiesta is born. If I could shape that time into chains or globes of palm leaf or bread, I would weave not only the fiesta but the moment of breaking an egg filled with colored paper seeds, and in those fragments the fiesta’s form would be found.

     Littoral gems, Murano glass, terracotta pitchers, and articulated toys. As if the city puts on feathers, mothers and uncles buy food and aloes under the dancing lights, and sometimes it just rains sweets.

     Crowds in lines like a jaguar dance. The greatest feast my people see. Beginning in the light of oranges, night smiles with red sparks and wheels. One year, someone broke an egg, releasing a dove as white as onion. The devil spat at us, and we threw rocks at him, along with bottles and green pears. Just to remind us how good the earth was that seventh day, the siren fell into her startled sea. The lotero called out winning figures: death, the drunk, and Don Ferruco—players marked their cards with beans. Pigeons fattened on tortillas.

     So great is this fiesta that it stands in the year’s sempiternal winding, like a three-day Sunday or a visit from a comet. The year visits and disappears; cotton wears out, is born again in the purple flower and soiled with sky. Cardboard figures dissolve in the rain. Someday, every day will be a fiesta.