The tribe of the Tzotzils wanders, scattered and persecuted. The punishment of the Caxláns reaches them even in the most remote spots, the most hidden corners. And even further than the Caxlán can reach come hunger, fear, cold, madness.

The rebels perished at the hands of their enemies and the meek were taken captive by the victors, who raped the women and put the mark of slavery on the rumps of newborn babies.

The survivors climbed to the highest slopes where the air they breath is sharp-edged, where the Caxlán’s heart, though it is so hard, bursts.

The survivors do not know how many of them there are. They never gather together, neither around a fire nor around food nor around the old people who give counsel nor around the long-memoried ones who recount. They hide from each other so as not to have to share the prey that will sustain them, the refuge that will shelter them.

Alone, these men forget their lineage, the dignity they once displayed, their past. They learn the sciences of furtiveness from fearful animals. They slip across the dry leaves without causing the least sound, they sidestep the trap, they play dead at the menace of danger.

Naked, barely covered with rags or loincloths of half-tanned leather, they have abolished the time that once separated them from bygone ages. Neither before nor today exists. It is always. Always defeat and persecution. Always the master who is not appeased by the most abject obedience or the most servile humility. Always the whip falling onto the submissive back. Always the knife lopping off the gesture of rebellion.

In this eternity, the tribe’s destiny is fulfilled. Because it is the will of the gods that the Tzotzils remain. In caves and in the open air, at night and under the blazing sun, females and males join together to perpetuate themselves. The fecundated woman walks slowly and hides near running water when the time comes to give birth.

The farmer, who kept the seed within his closed fist, lets it fall in the propitious place. He does not wait for the harvest. Someone else must come after him who will gather it in.

The weaver woman spins the tuft of wool. The work, whose design was taught to her parents by her grandparents, progresses.

Between skilled fingers, clay takes on the shape of a utensil and wood is smoothed down.

The shepherd, the midwife, the potter, repeat their trades as the earth repeats the cycle of the seasons, as the stars revisit the points of their orbit. Out of submission to the law, out of fidelity.

The soothsayer is also working. He recognizes his equals with a single glance, from far away. He exchanges the secret signal with them. And together they set out to give the gods what they clamor for: prayer, which their servants only succeed in stammering, and ceremony, which they guess at, invent, remember.