ROSITA TAUGHT ME TO DANCE written by MICHAEL (MIGUEL) FORBUS paintography and photography by MICHAEL FORBUS ROSITA TAUGHT ME TO DANCE WRITTEN BY MIGUEL When I was a young man, before I knew love of a woman I was thrown from my young stallion and suddenly blood spurted from my legs and blindingly white bones shone in the bright sun. I was quite the rider and rode bareback and won many a race against better steeds but no young man could talk to the horse as I could, I would talk as I leaned forward and urge the steed on and told him of the tales of mercury and how the wings caught the wind and won against all manner of steed, be they swift or full of magic. I would tell them of how our chains of poverty were falling away as we raced and gold coins were raining on our heads as we became one with the wind and we would live in a large hacienda, with room for all the children and my secret love, Rosita, of the Ballet Folklorico de le Vera Cruz. She was the youngest Prima dancer in all of the troupes and was famous through out all of old Mexico. She was young as I and I thought that by racing my stallion, I could win enough pesos to marry her though it might take years, but every year a few more pesos would go to the box under the bed and most to feed our family as papacito was too old and could not bend to the ground as he did as a strong young man. I was the man of the casa, and had the respect of my familia. My mother had gone to the ancestors after wearing her body out feeding and bearing so many children. Every year a handful of pesos would buy the tickets so that I might see Rosita dance in our pueblito. We all would attend as if in the church. She would whirl and spin and make rhythms with her hands and feet that hypnotized me. Myself and all others that watched enraptured by her young beauty. Her smile was the sun and her eyes seemed to meet mine every dance. She remembered me from years of sitting in the front. I clapped so loud, shy as I was. She always would smile at me. I could barely look in her eyes. Soon we would talk after the dance and she would walk with me in el centro for a round or two and a liquado. Then she would fly off like the dove with her family, her wealthy family, back to Vera Cruz and on to more shows. As for my legs, they were fractured like limbs of a mesquite would splinter in the high wind. My papacito called the brujo and begged her to help me. I was falling into a coma, a dream in which the pain left me with dreams of Rosita and I no longer had splintered bones but I danced with Rosita in the Ballet Folklorico in blinding white pantolones and comisa, my muscles as ropes and I would twirl her like a feather about the floor and the brujo was applying a tar to my legs and the men were pulling me by the ankles and under my chest. Soon the strongest men in the pueblo had pulled my splintered legs apart stretching my skin and the blood everywhere as if liquid roses soaked the bed, but the cup I drank from the brujo took me to another land, with Rosita and she was showing me to dance and new dances from Mexico city. As I danced my legs seem to fit together and like a puzzle the bruja directed the strongest men to hold me down but I did not struggle. I was dancing slowly with my Rosita and she whispered encouraging words to me right in my ear as I did the stallion. It was many turns of the moon before I woke from the coma and she kept me from dreaming bad dreams with the strong herbs she helped me sip. I almost was happy but for the pain. When she finally let me wake, my father was gone to my mother and I had to take charge of the house and learn to walk again. My hermanos would take me day and night and always keep me from the stable where my stallion still would fret from not being ridden by me, but all were afraid and now my box was empty and the Ballet Folklorico was again coming to town. I was but a cripple, and head of a family. But our family was so respected, that magical baskets of vegetables and fruit would appear for my familia. Days before the ballet and Rosita’s appearance, the rains of summer came and settled the dust and the heat was sufferable. I soon realized in tears in my hammock at night what I was now and I shook with chills and pain in my insides for my legs were bent and crooked like an old tree and my stallion had gone wild and not fit to ride and my saddle I had won with the silver conchos needed the soap and caring for. My box of hope for Rosita and I was empty. The day they arrived to set up for the ballet, Rosita’s father came to our casa and asked to see the stallion as he had heard the story. He talked to me as a man and soon my box was refilled and he had taken the stallion with many men to hold him from leaping to the sky. He and I knew we would never see each other again. Just as I knew I would never dance with Rosita in my life. Tonight was the last night I would see her. I took an extra cup of the brujo’s thick liquid and the boys carried me to the wagon. They carried me to the front of the tent and we soon heard the mariachi’s strike up the tuning and soon there she was and she had grown to a woman and more beautiful. As the thick liquid hit my stomach and then my head I was suddenly on the stage with her and she was teaching me new dances she had learned in the capital. She danced like a feather in my arms and her lips brushed mine more then once and my legs straightened and my back no longer bent from pain was straight and rigid and I could make the rhythm with my boots and we became the most magnificent couple the ballet have had dance for the company. I had worn my blindingly white peasant outfit with the woven sash and looked quite handsome as I sat there transformed as in a dream. Soon the curtain fell, as did the tears, burning my eyes, my face and my soul. Rosita would take the bows and she would be gone like my stallion, like my hopes…. As I lay here today in the hammock and my gnarled legs no longer can feel, but the pesos from the stallion, now gone with the father of Rosita, fed us and the boys carried me to take care of my personal business and we survived. The brujo would stop ever week or so and give to me the thick liquid, stronger by the week and I would fall into a dream and Rosita was there and she taught me more dances and as I became more and more reliant on the bruja, the tears fell less until my memories of that were gone, as was the pain in my useless legs and my unused heart and I began to feel nothing, a hole where my heart was. Although many nights I would wake with a start and call out for the boys to fetch my saddle for I would race tomorrow and it needed the soap and the sweat would pour and I could not remember my dreams any longer. Sometimes in the distance I would hear the mariachis and I would remember something, a small thing and my heart would beat fast, but I could never recall what it was. WRITTEN BY Michael (Miguel) Forbus