Braided Sorrow
Winner of the 2006 Chicano / Latino Literary Prize
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
UC Irvine
Marisela Treviño Orta
243 Park Street Unit B
San Francisco, CA 94118
415.939.0606
[email protected]
Braided Sorrow
Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 1
La Llorona
The weeping woman, an apparition, a mourning mother. She is a
ghost from the past, an omen, a mother who has lost her daughter
and a woman murdered in the desert. She is displaced by time and
loss. Age range 30s—40s
Alma
A girl from San Luis Potosí. Like many of the missing women in
Juarez she has long dark hair. Age 16
Socorro
Alma and Carlos’ aunt. Age range 50s
Carlos
Alma’s older brother. Age range late 20s
Yadria
Carlos’ wife. Age range mid 20s
Eulalia
Socorro’s comadre. Age range 50s
Señor Fillmore
Manager of a maquiladora, Alma’s boss. He is neither American
nor Mexican, yet both. Preferably he is a fair-skinned Latino. Age
range late 30s
Officer
Police officer in a station where the bodies of women found in
Juarez are brought for identification. Age range 20s—30s
MAN 1/ 2/ 3/ 4
Street thugs in Juarez. Age range 20s—30s
Where
A bus terminal, a one-room home in Juarez, México, a maquiladora, a bus stop, a desert and
a police station.
Note
Scene titles are to be announced before each scene begins. If ALMA is on stage beginning
or ending a scene then she will announce the scene before action begins. If she is not on
stage, another character will do so. Officer and Man 4 are played by the same actor.
Monologues are written as poems and should be read as poems.
Playbill Note
One of the omens of doom that foretold the coming of the Spanish and the fall of the
Aztec empire was a woman in white wandering the streets of Tenochtitlan, wailing.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 2
Act 1, Scene 1
Cutting Hair
The soft trickle of water. Lights up slowly on
ALMA who sits on a square plastic crate combing
her hair. She makes a ponytail and braids her
hair, letting it fall over her shoulder onto her chest.
She finishes the braid and ties a second band
around its end. She picks up a pair of scissors on
the crate next to her and studies the blades.
ALMA takes a long look at her braid, running her
free hand along the braid until firmly grasping it
at the end. She begins to cut her hair slowly,
having difficulty with the scissors.
Enter SOCORRO.
SOCORRO:
Alma? ¿Qué estás haciendo?
ALMA lowers the scissors.
ALMA:
I thought, I thought it might be better if I didn’t have long hair.
SOCORRO takes ALMA’s chin in her hand.
SOCORRO:
¿Estás segura?
ALMA:
Yes. I don’t want it any more. It’s nothing but trouble.
SOCORRO:
(Taking the scissors, nodding) Here, let me.
SOCORRO comes behind ALMA and takes her
braid in one hand, scissors in the other. She tells
ALMA the following story, the story and the
cutting of the braid end simultaneously.
SOCORRO:
Did you ever see those old washing machines?
The ones with the electric rollers that press the water out?
When I first came here to Juarez I worked at a laundry service.
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p. 3
There was a girl named Dolores.
She had beautiful long jet-black hair.
Usually she had it pulled back
like the rest of us
but one Friday
she decided to wear it down,
a long black braid.
It got caught in a bed sheet
caught in the rollers.
SOCORRO pauses and shakes her head, trying to
dispel a disturbing image.
SOCORRO:
After that
when we came back to work
they made all of us cut our hair.
SOCORRO holds the cut braid in her hand and
then hands it to ALMA. ALMA takes the braid
and looks at it. SOCORRO rests her hand on
ALMA’s shoulder.
ALMA:
(Said slowly for double meaning) Dolor-es…
Lights shift.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 4
Act 1, Scene 2
A Matter of Economics
Lights up on CARLOS and YADRIA. YADRIA
sits on a plastic crate. CARLOS paces behind her.
CARLOS:
What do you mean they fired you?
YADRIA:
They said it was company policy. They don’t let women work at the maquila if
they’re…
CARLOS:
What?
YADRIA:
Pregnant.
CARLOS:
Yadria, why would they think you’re pregnant?
YADRIA:
Every three weeks we have to…we have to take a pregnancy test. All the women
have to do it.
CARLOS:
You never mentioned any of this before.
YADRIA:
They tell you when to eat, when to start, when to stop, when you can go use the
restroom…You’re watched the entire time—even from the inside. It’s bad enough at
work, I didn’t want to have to tell you.
CARLOS gently removes a strand of hair from
YADRIA’s face. He then places his hand on her
stomach.
YADRIA:
It’s too soon for that, Carlos.
CARLOS:
It’s never too soon.
YADRIA begins to cry.
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p. 5
CARLOS:
Shh…don’t cry.
YADRIA:
What are we going to do? We can’t afford a baby. We’re barely scrapping by as it is.
CARLOS:
I’ll think of something. Alma got the job, didn’t she?
YADRIA:
Five dollars a day, it’s not enough. What’ll we send back home to your parents?
There won’t be enough for them, for us, for another mouth.
CARLOS:
Don’t worry.
YADRIA:
But Alma and I were going to work together. It’s not safe for her to go alone.
CARLOS:
Well, we can’t send her back to my parents, we spent three months savings to bring
her up here. What about another factory?
YADRIA:
No maquila will hire a pregnant woman.
YADRIA becomes nauseated. Her breath a little
labored.
YADRIA:
Doesn’t matter. I couldn’t take it even if they did hire me. Locked up all day in a
factory with only the metallic smell of sweat, the summer heat pressing down on
me, suffocating, dragging at my heels when I walk, sliding down the small of my
back.
Now what are we going to do? How are we going to raise our child?
CARLOS:
What about the El Paso job? The one Doña Eulalia mentioned?
YADRIA:
Carlos, they only have one opening. What about Alma?
CARLOS:
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p. 6
You can get Alma a job there, too.
YADRIA:
How Carlos? They’re looking for experienced workers. Alma hasn’t had a real job
before.
CARLOS:
You can convince them.
YADRIA:
But that will take time. In the meantime what’s she supposed to do? She has to
work somewhere or we won’t have enough money to eat.
CARLOS:
She’ll have to work in the maquila for a little while, at least until you can get her a
job in El Paso.
YADRIA:
But—
CARLOS:
I don’t like either, Yadria. I don’t like sending my little sister to work in one of
those factories. But we don’t have a choice.
YADRIA:
My mother was right. Choice is a luxury. God help us.
CARLOS:
She’ll be all right. It’s temporary. We’ll get her out of there as soon as we can.
YADRIA:
As soon as we can.
Lights shift.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 7
Act 1, Scene 3
Welcome to Juarez
In the dark before lights up the sounds of a bus
terminal. In Spanish the announcements for bus
departures. The sounds fade as lights come up.
ALMA sits on a suitcase playing with her hair, a
long braid that cascades over her shoulder.
ALMA holds a tattered book in her hand. The
sound of water trickling, a woman in a simple
white peasant dress enters. Her hair is stringy and
wet, her feet bare. ALMA does not hear the water.
LA LLORONA enters and comes right up to
ALMA, listening to her read.
ALMA:
(Reading from the book) she did not speak since speech was unknown to her
her eyes were the color of distant love
her arms were made of matching topaz
her lips were silenced in coral light…
ALMA notices LA LLORONA but tries to
continue reading.
ALMA:
and suddenly she left by that door
hardly had she entered the river than she was cleansed
gleaming like a white stone in the rain…
LA LLORONA:
White stone in the rain.
The poem distresses LA LLORONA, she appears
to be crying.
ALMA:
Are you all right? Can I help you?
LA LLORONA:
I was looking for something. I heard a voice. (Touches her forehead) There’s so many
voices. So many echoes. Everywhere.
ALMA:
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Echoes? I don’t hear anything.
LA LLORONA:
Ripples of grief. This city’s filled with them.
ALMA:
Are you all right? Here sit down.
ALMA helps LA LLORONA sit down.
LA LLORONA:
I haven’t been myself lately. (Pause)
I can feel them slipping into me. So many voices. They’re coming to me, to mourn.
ALMA:
Maybe I should find a doctor.
LA LLORONA:
No. It’ll pass.
ALMA:
Can I get you anything?
LA LLORONA:
I need to find the river.
Touches LA LLORONA’s wet hair,
clothes.
ALMA:
The river? But you’re soaked.
LA LLORONA:
(Looking at the ground as if seeing water) Have you ever seen the waters of Texcoco?
(Pronounced: Tesh coco) Moonlight, the canals shimmered with it and when you
dipped your hands beneath its surface you could feel it envelop your skin, its
coolness race up your arms and spread over your body until you glowed, white
stone in the rain…
ALMA:
Texcoco? Are you from Mexico City?
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p. 9
LA LLORONA:
Not really. You’re not from Juarez.
ALMA:
No. I just got here.
LA LLORONA:
From where?
ALMA:
San Luis Potosí.
LA LLORONA:
(Saying as if the word is new in her mouth) Po-to-sí. Is that far from here?
ALMA:
Oh, yes. We rode the bus all day yesterday and all through the night. We had to
sleep sitting up. Well, Yadria let me rest my head in her lap. Carlos wasn’t so
lucky. He had trouble sleeping all the way here.
LA LLORONA:
I know the feeling. I used to sleepwalk.
ALMA:
You did?
LA LLORONA:
From one life to the next. From stream to creek. I usually flow with the water, this
is the first time I’ve ever come upstream. There’s something here, something about
this river… it’s not much of a river though, more like piss trickling down a drain.
ALMA:
(Hesitating) It is different here.
LA LLORONA:
Why did you come here? Why are you in this desert?
ALMA:
To be closer to the border. To work. Well, for now at least. I have to send money
to my parents, they need it. I had to stop going to school so I could come here.
I’m not complaining. After all there aren’t any jobs back home. Even the church
closed. Everyone comes here. They can’t help it. Almost….almost drawn here.
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LA LLORONA:
Drawn here…Can you feel the desert, too?
ALMA:
Oh yes, it’s very dry here. Yadria told me to put Vaseline on my elbows and hands
three times a day. Deserts are like that she said, so dry the skin around your nails
gets flaky and white, before you know it they start bleeding.
LA LLORONA:
Bleeding.
ALMA:
From the dryness.
LA LLORONA:
So dry. I can feel moisture in the air, the skin awakens to it.
(Beat)
(Shivering) Do you feel that?
ALMA:
A breeze?
LA LLORONA:
A shroud pulling itself over the desert.
LA LLORONA lowers an ear to the ground,
ALMA watches intently, leaning closer to LA
LLORONA.
LA LLORONA:
I can hear it. (Beat) It’s groaning.
ALMA:
The ground?
LA LLORONA:
It’s sick … festering.
LA LLORONA takes ALMA’s hand and pulls
her down, both are kneeling.
LA LLORONA:
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p. 11
(Placing Alma’s hand on the ground) Can you feel it? Can you feel it pulsing?
ALMA is quiet, her entire body listens.
ALMA:
What is that?
From offstage right the voice of ALMA’s brother
CARLOS. LA LLORONA rises at the sound of
his voice and prepares to exit.
CARLOS:
(Off stage) Alma. Alma, our ride’s here.
ALMA:
What is that?
LA LLORONA:
My daughters.
CARLOS:
(Off stage) Alma.
LA LLORONA:
My daughters…they’re hunting my daughters.
LA LLORONA exits quickly. ALMA watches
her leave. Lights shift.
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p. 12
Act 1, Scene 4
A Mother in the Market
Sounds of a bustling mercado. Lights up.
SOCORRO and EULALIA stand center stage.
SOCORRO holds a basket with fruit and
EULALIA holds a bag over one shoulder filled
with groceries. They stand behind a counter
covered with a white tablecloth on top of which
are mounds of pomegranates and mangos. A sign
reads: Granadas / Mangos. They gently squeeze
mangos, testing for ripeness.
EULALIA:
How’s your niece doing?
SOCORRO:
(Hesitating, holding a mango) She’s still having nightmares.
EULALIA:
And her hair? Is it growing back?
SOCORRO:
N’ombre, it’ll take a few years to grow back. I don’t know what her mother’s going
to say.
EULALIA:
Are you going to tell her what happened?
SOCORRO:
Alma and Carlos don’t want to worry her. But sooner or later they’re going to have
to tell her something. Imagine if she came for a visit and discovered that her niñita
chopped off almost all her hair.
EULALIA:
What’d you do with the hair?
SOCORRO:
Alma kept it, hid it somewhere, I think.
EULALIA:
Pues, hair or no hair, I’m just glad she’s okay.
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p. 13
SOCORRO:
Gracias a Dios. I don’t want to think what might have happened if that other
woman hadn’t appeared.
EULALIA:
No, don’t think about that.
LA LLORONA enters, walks center stage next to
the pomegranates, taking one in her hand.
LA LLORONA:
My daughter. She loved pomegranates.
SOCORRO and EULALIA look at one another
and at LA LLORONA a little mystified by her
dress and daydream expression.
EULALIA:
I’m sure she’ll like any of these.
LA LLORONA holds the pomegranate up to her
cheek.
EULALIA:
They’re in season now, the juice is such a deep red.
LA LLORONA:
Such a deep red.
SOCORRO:
Are you all right?
LA LLORONA recites her monologue in a
measured manner, as if looking back into her
memory.
LA LLORONA:
The last time I saw my daughter
she was wearing her favorite shirt
a sky-blue camiseta I gave her on her birthday.
She was standing
with other girls that she worked with
waiting for the bus
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p. 14
rocking from foot to foot.
Not impatient
no, she wasn’t like that.
It was just something
she used to do as a child.
That’s how she daydreamed
rocking from side to side
over one foot
then the next
staring past the city
streets around her.
(Beat)
She didn’t come home that afternoon.
The police didn’t care.
Said she probably “ran away.”
Asked me if she was in a gang
if she did drugs
or ran around with boys.
I walked up and down these streets
carrying her picture
looking for anyone
who had seen my daughter,
anyone who could tell me
where she was.
I had hoped
just a little, that maybe,
maybe she was still alive.
It was a little boy
a little boy who found her
while playing out in Lote Bravo.
They wouldn’t let me identify her.
They said they were sure it was her.
Her factory name tag
was found next to her body.
LA LLORONA puts the pomegranate back on
the table.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 15
LA LLORONA:
All they gave me was her torn
faded blue shirt,
crumpled, thick with dust…
(As she exits) Torn, faded, thick with dust…smelling like the desert.
The pomegranates begin to bleed juice. A dark
stain spreads down the length of the tablecloth, the
juice spills onto the floor. EULALIA takes hold of
SOCORRO’s arm.
EULALIA:
Madre de Dios.
Lights shift.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 16
Act 1, Scene 5
Working for Señor Fillmore
The sounds of a factory floor. Lights up on a
workstation in a factory. There is a pitiful
oscillating fan near the workstation. Enter
SEÑOR FILLMORE followed at a short distance
by ALMA who is wearing a cheap factory uniform
over her clothes.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
And here’s your workstation. Much better than the one Yadria had. Yesss…feel
that? (Waits for Alma to lean in a bit) Closer to the fan. I know, it’s hard to tell. All
it seems to do is push hot air around, but after a couple of days you’ll appreciate
the difference. It’s pretty amazing, the human body, how…sensitive it can be to the
lack of moisture. Part of living in a desert I guess.
Now. You sit here.
He holds the chair in front of his body. ALMA
hesitates. He pats the seat with his hand.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
Come on, have a seat, make yourself comfortable.
ALMA sits.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
Now, at seven you’ll start your training. It’s pretty straightforward, I’m sure you’ll
get the hang of it. Lunch is at noon, twenty minutes.
I’m happy to say you’ll be making $4.75 a day, that’s the highest in Juarez…we want
to keep our workers happy so they’ll stick around, that’s called “corporate
longevity.” (Pause) Anyway, as I was saying, you’ll get a paycheck on Saturday after
work.
Now, you must remember to arrive before they lock the doors, tardiness isn’t
tolerated. You arrive after they lock the doors you lose your job. We don’t open
those doors for anybody. Company policy. Any questions?
ALMA:
Is there a restroom?
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SEÑOR FILLMORE:
Hmmmm, you’d better wait until lunch time. Then just follow the crowd, but walk
quickly so you can get at the front of the line.
Well, that about covers it. Oh, one last thing.
He gives her a plastic name badge with the word
TRAINEE.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
This will have to do until we can make you one of your own.
ALMA puts it on.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
Here, let me help.
He straightens her name badge and rests a hand
on her shoulder. ALMA looks at the hand.
SEÑOR FILLMORE:
There you go. Well Alma, welcome to our little family.
Lights shift.
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Marisela Treviño Orta
p. 18
Act 1, Scene 6
An Opportunity Arises
SOCORRO and EULALIA walk into the space
that was ALMA’s workstation. They cover the
counter with black trash bags and convert it to
their kitchen counter. They scrape needles off the
flat cactus leaves with knives, letting the scraping
fall onto the trash bags.
EULALIA:
They’re all gone. Left this morning.
SOCORRO
Gone?
EULALIA:
Nieves packed up her granddaughters and headed back to Zacatecas. Said she
didn’t want their faces on missing posters, pinned to telephone poles like moths.
SOCORRO:
I’ve lived here just as long as Nieves, I never thought she’d go back. Even with all
the disappearing.
EULALIA:
That’s why she left. It got a little too close to home.
SOCORRO:
¡Aye!
SOCORRO suddenly holds her hand, pricked by a
cactus needle. EULALIA puts down her knife
and cactus leaf.
EULALIA:
¿Qué pasó? (Examines Socorro’s hand)
SOCORRO:
Una espina.
EULALIA:
Here, let me take that out.
SOCORRO:
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p. 19
What did you mean about Nieves?
EULALIA:
(Intent on Socorro’s hand) About a week ago she woke up to the sound of whimpering
just outside their front door. There on the ground sat a girl, covered in her own
blood, head to foot, trembling. Would hardly let Nieves touch her. She’d been
beaten, strangled ‘til unconscious and left for dead. (Gently pulling the needle from
Socorro’s hand) There you go. Who says cactus don’t bite back? Cuidate, you’re
bleeding.
SOCORRO:
Who was she?
EULALIA:
The girl? A worker en una maquiladora. She’d been riding the bus, one the factories
send to the neighborhood. Except the bus driver didn’t drop her off. He drove her
out into the desert.
She thought she was dead at first. All alone in the desert, in the dark.
Nieves decided to leave that night. Left a good-paying job in El Paso. It’s because
of her I was able to get a job with Señora Fuentes. With Nieves gone they’ll be
looking for someone else to help clean houses. This could be just the thing for
Carlos’ wife. Get her out of that factory and working in El Paso.
When did you say they’ll be back?
SOCORRO:
Tonight, late. It’s a long drive from San Luis.
EULALIA:
It’ll be so good to have Carlos and Yadria back. It’s been too quiet here.
SOCORRO:
I just wish they weren’t bringing Alma here. She’s too young, barely sixteen. I don’t
know why my sister’s letting her come here.
EULALIA:
Times are hard. They need the money.
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p. 20
SOCORRO:
And the girl Nieves found? Did she need money, too?
Working all day, in this heat. Coming home in the dark, or not at all. It’s not
worth five dollars a day.
Ever since those gringos starting bringing their factories over here, Juarez hasn’t been
the same. In all the time they’ve been here, what have they brought us? Absolutely
nothing.
EULALIA:
Factories springing up all along the border.
SOCORRO:
The only successful weed in the desert…
EULALIA:
Juarez was going to be a city of the future, ¿Te acuerdas? A city of dreams.
SOCORRO:
More like we wandered into a nightmare. (Beat) They found another body this
morning.
EULALIA:
(Taken aback) Another body, madre de Dios.
SOCORRO:
On the outskirts of town. They said the ground was still moist, still red.
Lights shift.
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p. 21