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Delahoyde & Hughes
Orpheus
THE MAYAN
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The Popul Vuh (trans.: Book of the Council) records the Mayan
creation myths as written down in the middle of the 16th century. For
roughly 2000 years the Mayans did well in Central America with a warrior
culture relying on slave labor and a rather sophisticated government.
They had a two-king system, which is projected backwards to the twin
brothers who play a role after this excerpt.
The creation is quite psychedelic with its weird style, emphasis on
verbs, and lack of pronoun antecedents: "Now it still ripples, now it
still murmurs, it still sighs, still hums..." (491). Creation is the
joint project of the sky and water forces: Heart of Sky and Plumed
Serpent -- once again, the mythological logic of it taking two to create.
Naming is a magical act: "it was simply their word that brought it forth"
(492).
The peopling of the earth is a dramatic tale.
And so they fell, just an experiment and just a cutout for humankind.
They were talking at first but their faces were dry. They were not yet
developed in the legs and arms. They had no blood, no lymph. They had no
sweat, no fat. Their complexions were dry, their faces were crusty. They
flailed their legs and arms, their bodies were deformed.
And so they accomplished nothing before the Maker, Modeler who gave them
birth, gave them heart. (493)
"You caused us pain, you ate us, but now it is you whom we
shall eat." (493)
The truth is that you should appreciate and care for even inanimate
things in your possession. Cleaning your kitchen utensils is a way of
honoring the Maker. Don't even try to tell me you don't have some
inanimate object in your possession that you consider "sacred." For me,
it's some prefab bookcases that I bought in grad school and lugged to my
apartment and to everywhere I've lived ever since. They are practically
worthless monetarily and in fact a burden now. I can easily get rid of
these and already have superseded them with much more useful and
glamorous bookcases. But THEY ARE SACRED so get your damn hands off my
bookcases!
It's the same thing, or should be, for tortilla griddles.
The last line of this excerpt brings up another rather vast mythological
theme:
The Popul Vuh. (Excerpt.) Writing About the World. 2nd ed.
by Susan McLeod et al. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace and Co., 1995. 491-494.
They came into being, they multiplied, they had daughters, they had sons,
these manikins, woodcarvings. But there was nothing in their hearts and
nothing in their minds, no memory of their mason and builder. They just
went and walked wherever they wanted. Now they did not remember Heart of
Sky.
So this mindless batch are wiped out by a flood. It's difficult to
determine if the next part refers to a second experiment or if it's still
the first batch being harassed. But it's vivid!
Everything spoke: their water jars, their tortilla griddles, their
plates, their cooking pots, their dogs, their grinding stones, each and
every thing crushed their faces. Their dogs and turkeys told them:
The grinding stones, fed up with their lot in life, rebel and grind their
owners' flesh. Even the tortilla griddles get into the act:
"Pain!" That's all you've done for us. Our mouths are sooty, out faces
are sooty. By setting us on the fire all the time, you burn us. Since
we felt no pain, you try it. We shall burn you," all their
cooking pots said, crushing their faces. (494)
So here's the question. One can easily understand the moral of part of
the story: treating your dogs bad is a poor idea, and not taking care of
your turkeys is not wise. But tortilla griddles? I'm offending the
sensibilities of my cooking pots and tortilla griddles if I put them on
the fire to make tortillas which is what they are for in the first
place?! What to do about the tortilla griddles -- that's the big
mythological question.
So this is why monkeys look like people: they are a sign of a previous
human work, human design -- mere manikins, mere woodcarvings. (494)
It turns out that our predecessors and the race of creatures who
functioned as the failed experiment were monkeys. Apes are a recurring
mythological theme because they creep us out by blurring the categories
between human and animal. [See Apes.] We're
assured in this myth and others that we are worthier than they, but the
warning against accomplishing nothing before the Maker lingers.