Shadow of the Hawk
They say his trouble began when he was young. Tomás was six years old when he started school. In Kindergarten he acted normal. He played with the other kids, he liked to hear stories, and he liked to laugh. But all that changed. In Kindergarten his teacher spoke Spanish. That was the only language that Tomás knew!
In first grade, his teacher spoke Spanish and English. Her name was Miss Orozco. She was nice and the children liked her. All of them except Tomás. For she tried to teach him English. Tomás hated her for that because he hated the strange sounds of the new words.
He changed from a happy boy to a quiet one. He did not shout like the other children, even on the playground at recess. He had much hatred in his heart for the Americans. He had much anger in his soul toward the Anglos. He was only a little boy but he hated like a man.
Tomás did not answer the teacher unless she spoke to him in Spanish. And this is how it was with him, in the first grade. And it remained the same in the second grade, and then the third, and even the fourth.
He grew even more silent and sometimes refused to answer the teachers, even when they wished to speak Spanish with him. For Tomás there was only one language, Spanish. There was only one country, Mexico. And he did not trust anyone who did not feel the same way.
His friends began to worry about him for in his eyes was a hard black glint, a look of cold, unforgiving anger. They saw a look that said: someday I will explode! Someday I will make people listen to what I have to say! Someday I will be heard!!!
But Tomás was not dumb. He saw a great deal. He watched people as they moved. He observed the behavior of the teachers when they talked together. He could not understand one word of English but he knew by sight all the teachers who spoke the strange tongue.
In the 3rd and 4th grades, he began to speak his mind. In Spanish. He began to tell the teacher of his pride in being a Mexican. He began telling his classmates of the great civilizations that existed in Mexico for thousands of years.
These were the stories he learned at home. These were the stories that Tomás was unwilling to abandon. His classmates learned English so they could beg for pizza. He could not beg for a “pizza” like a beggar in the streets of Mexico City.
At first the teachers liked to hear Tomás. It meant that he was opening up, didn’t it? It meant that he was beginning to trust teachers. But they forgot about his anger and his hatred. Maybe they had never seen it; maybe they had never gotten a real good look into the deepest pools of blackness within Tomás’ eyes, where even his innocent soul shed no light.
The explosion came in the 5th grade. True, his rebellion began the year before but nobody knew what it was. They thought he was just acting bad. It was his behavior, they all said. Only Tomás knew; only Tomás knew that he could control his anger or let loose his temper when the moment suited him. Tomás was the master, not the school.
He began to make speeches to his classmates in the 4th grade. In Spanish, of course. He would stand up, whether the teacher has asked him or not. Then he would attack the school and how it was destroying the vitality of his people. He lashed out at the teachers for telling lies, not truths. They say some teachers liked to hear him talk when he got angry because Tomás was a good speaker. Others hoped his anger would pass by the time he moved on to the 5th grade. He was speaking a little English sometimes—wasn’t that a good sign?
But in the 5th grade his anger grew and his speeches gave the teachers no peace. He began to challenge school authority many times. He began to ask his friends to help him. He shouted in class one day: “This is my school, not yours! This is my neighborhood, my race, my language, my culture!” And the teachers knew the problem would not go away.
So they began to get tough with him, hoping to break his stubborn spirit. But Tomás had the independence of the true Indian. They could have tortured him; it wouldn’t have mattered!
In the bones of Tomás were the hopes and dreams of millions of Mexicans. In his mind and in his memory, were the visions from thousands of years of Mexican history. In his heart, beat the red blood of a Mexican. In his mouth flowed words of Spanish, the words of his father and mother and of their parents and grandparents before them.
The teachers gave him sentences to write: 10, 20, 50, 100 times. They made him miss his recess. They kept him after school in detention. They called his parents to complain. They gave him a one-day suspension, then two days, then three days–and once for a whole week!
Tomás did not bend. He was an oak tree. He would not bend before them. The Principal and the teachers got together and talked. Some of them liked the boy; they knew he was bright, they knew he would amount to something. But Tomás was getting more and more difficult to manage and he was getting students to listen to him.
When he walked around the playground during Lunch Recess, many students followed behind him. All of them refused to speak English and they began talking of their pride in being Mexican. And so the teachers and the Principal sadly knew what they had to do. They had no choice but to expel Tomás from the school. He was a Trouble-Maker.
And so it came to pass, on a warm Spring day in May. The school-year was nearly over but the teachers were eager to make an example of Tomás. With this punishment, they would scare the other students. They would take away their leader, then the others would settle down.
The teachers thought that they were wise. But on the day Tomás was to leave school, they forgot one little thing: the other students.
Tomás cleaned out his desk. He had a few papers and pencils with him, in his hands. He started out the door to walk across the playground and then the big grassy field, for the last time. He would not be allowed back, that much he knew.
This was the price he had to pay for speaking only Spanish. This was his punishment for telling his friends that they were still Mexicans and should be proud!
His head was held high as he walked out the door. It was the noon hour and hundreds of children were playing games: basketball, jump-rope, four-square, tetherball, soccer, foot races, hula hoops, baseball.
They saw him. Slowly at first, a kid here and there stopped playing to watch Tomás. Then a few more kids stopped their games. Soon the whole playground was coming to a stop. Some students began moving towards him, to say goodbye.
And then suddenly, in front of him, they were lining up, in two straights rows all the way from the blacktop out onto the playing field. They were four or five deep on each side but they left a path for Tomás to walk down the middle between them.
It looked for a moment like an old-fashioned spanking parade. But these children were not there to spank. They were there to watch, to see him, to touch him, to say goodbye.
The students who had believed in him the most, they were there. And so was every other student in the school. It would have done no good for the teachers to blow their whistles to make the students come back; they were not coming back. Not yet, anyway. For they had something more important to do, all of them. They had to say goodbye to Tomás!
When he first left the classroom, the spirits of Tomás were very low. He put on a show of bravery but he did not feel it within him, in his heart. But now when he saw hundreds of students lining up to see him pass, he felt a strong new pride surging through his veins!
He held his head higher than ever and his black Mexican hair shone with great luster under the bright sun in the blue sky. He even showed his pearly white teeth for just a second, in a brief flash of happiness. But the moment was very somber for him and the smile quickly passed, to be seen no more.
The students who had just wanted to touch Tomás as he passed, changed their minds. All stood perfectly straight, proud of their brother who was walking past them. The teachers saw only a foolish boy but his friends saw far more. They saw a brother, a man, a chief. They saw the eagle and the hawk.
And as all came to a standstill, the shrill cry of a hawk was heard far overhead. Flying out of the blue sky from the west, a hawk began circling the playground. It began to fly lower and lower in ever smaller circles, until its very shadow fell on the playground below.
And then it happened! The shadow of the hawk fell right on top of Tomás, even as the hawk circled round him and uttered a short shrill cry. Tomás looked up for an instant and a wide smile raced across his face, and his eyes shone with happiness!
Even his Brother the Hawk had come to see him! And all the students who saw the smile of Tomás knew that the hawk was his brother. And then, flying higher and higher, the hawk flew high up in the sky and passed from their sight.
Tomás looked at his friends. He began walking. He walked down the middle between the two rows, with a little space left open on either side of him. This moment, the teachers had meant to be his shame. But his friends were turning it into his victory! He knew that when they went back to their classrooms, no matter what the teacher said, they would never again forget who they were.
They were brown people of the sun and of the earth. They were Mexicans, one and all! And Tomás smiled inwardly to himself, for he had a younger cousin who was to start school in the fall. His cousin was the same as him, only more so!
His cousin was stubborn, proud, and Mexican. And where Tomás was just part-Indian, his cousin was even more INDIAN!!! The teachers were going to have their hands very full, for Tomás’ cousin was much the same! True, his cousin was learning a little English but the time would surely come when he too would be ready to challenge school authority . . . when he would make speeches, when he would say:
“THIS IS MY SCHOOL! THIS IS MY LAND!
THIS IS MY NEIGHBORHOOD, NOT YOURS!
THIS IS MY PEOPLE, MY RACE, MY LANGUAGE, MY CULTURE!
I AM MEXICAN AND PROUD OF IT!
VIVA MEXICO! VIVA LA RAZA!!!”
But for now, Tomás had a walk to finish. It was not the long or lonely walk that he thought it would be. His friends felt the appearance of the hawk to be like a blessing; now there was no hiding the love in their eyes. Tomás walked across the grassy playing field and out the gate on the other side and headed towards home, without ever once looking back.
On the playground, all the students stood silent and motionless for some minutes. They were waiting for the teachers to call, the whistles to blow, the bell to ring. But for that moment, they stood there silently, feeling and believing what they had just seen. They were proud to have been present when Tomás left their school, forever.
And they remembered the Shadow of the Hawk, the hawk who had called out for all to hear:
Tomás is brother to the hawk!
