2011 Issue - Santa Fe Community College

(you flagged him down in his truck) . “No, a couple here wants to
know.” He hangs up and points in the opposite direction: “It’s back that
way. Follow the road up and around for awhile until it forks and then
there should be a cemetery on your right.”
And so you arrive at the fourth identical cemetery of the day, the
now-familiar windmills, grottos and floral wreaths dirtied by the
weather. But no Dennis Hopper, only itchy tumbleweeds and abandoned
trucks and American flags. Who would want to be buried in a
cemetery like this he asks you in the silence. He has a harder time finding
the romance in decay than you do.
Tired, you finally head towards the tiny Taos Casino as the day is
concluding and the shadows are lengthening. You pass another cemetery
and think about not stopping. But what if this is the one Dammit.
That’s exactly how it would happen, after all. You turn the car around.
Half the cemetery is lit with the overexposed light of a New Mexico
sun slowly waning, casting long, exaggerated silhouettes of yourself
against the backdrop of graves. But you’re tired of this quest, now, so instead
you start a photo shoot of the creepy statuettes and sad little
cherubs with their sad little cheeks in their hands. You squat and shove
the camera between scrolled ironwork to capture a grotto Mary perfectly
placed between clumps of red and pink and yellow plastic carnations
and suddenly the flash goes off by itself. It reflects the exact moment of
receding golden sunset at the exact moment when the metal sunshine
waves surrounding grotto Mary light up in a blinding glare…and then
the flash turns itself off.
You walk it over to him and pull up the picture: Look what just happened
in this picture—the flash went off by itself. It makes it look cool,
don’t you think Like she’s on fire or something.
He pretends to gasp. It’s a miracle, he says. We’ve found it: Our
Lady of the Taos Cemetery.
Maybe he’s right you wonder as you leave the cemetery, besides,
what the hell were they looking for in that movie, anyway All that talk
of smoking grass and skinny dipping and the Steppenwolf soundtrack,
sure, but weren’t they just wandering around, too, looking for the message
behind the veil For the first time you wonder if Dennis Hopper,
under his humble pile of rocks, finally found it.
80 Santa Fe Literary Review