The Book of Duels (9 page)

Peleas de Gallo
: Caesar v. I Am

In the Last Legal Cockfight in the United States, Pumpkin Center, Louisiana,

August 15, 2008

Caesar Julius, 29 Months,

Dan Gray Roundhead, 4.02 lbs, Record: 8–0

 

A
peace stills the certain center of me when he takes my beak inside his mouth, rubs my fluff feathers, and settles the jerking muscles along my spine—he does not call me chanticleer nor the vile cock but rather
Caesar
, always
Caesar
, cooing with his sweet hands on me—even as they dubbed my wattle and comb, his look calmed me—his eyes focus my attention, save me from all distraction: the pickups eaten by rust and rent with neglect; the old man pushing the wheelbarrow filled with ice water and cans of beer, shouting above the other shouts of men with cash and knives pushed at each other; the smells of turpentine and sawdust, whiskey and tobacco—so I’ll crow from the mountaintops: I love my man more than my hens—shameful to some, I know, like this rooster strutting across from me, contempt nested there in his eyes, yet in these last still moments before combat I can’t help myself: I slip into thoughts of his hands on my back cape, stroking my neck, and the solemn way he takes the leather straps and wets them and fastens the razor-gaffs to my spur stumps and runs his thumbnails up the ridges of my shank—sometimes I feign fevered exhaustion just so he’ll spit in my mouth, almost, but never quite, quenching my thirst—for his affections I have become lethal, killing again and again, and though I hate the spurting gore I cause, my fellow birds bleeding their lives out for me, I’d bathe gladly preening in their guts for the joy it brings my man—

And this puffed-up Bantam across from me will be no different: steady me, Sun, and forgive me please my unnatural love, but I will have my man crow once more,
Caesar! Caesar!

I Am, 26 Months,

O’Neal Red, 4.07 lbs, Record: 6–0

 

M
e rooster strut daddy, me señor cock of the walk, gotta prick longer than yo’ talon gaff—look at this
maricón
, this capon they’ve brought me to slay, too lazy to learn his proper pecking order place—I put him just above these sad-ass men who’ve come to see the rooster snuft again but ain’t brought enough fire to kill me yet—I can see it in his eyes, his cooing eyes cooing that cock handler’s eyes—but what’s a man to me but a builder of fences and cages, while I am free with skill enough to holler the Sun, and the Sun know better than not rise when I peck and call. Because I Am the greatest—been blessed with this chest, swollen and strong as any Bantam you ever saw—when asked why fight, I say,
Why not?
—I Am: hot like July sand, like God don’t give a damn, and it ain’t nothing but a thang for me to survey my land perched ten feet off the ground, while empty-headed chicken heads empty they eggs into my nests—I Am: still here because I say you ain’t, and because I say it, boy, you ain’t—I Am: bowed up and just so purty, watch how I dance my cockerelwaltz—and when you call me
fighter
, I correct, and say
killer:
four pounds of fury ready for any round robin, rounding up robins and bobbin jays straying too close to the lane, keepin them fox and snake at bay.

And you, you needs to pray, Little One, for the odd chance to find any one of my tail feathers fallen, use it as a talisman to conjure the devil, and when you do, ask him for me:
Which came first, Old Scratch, the chicken or the egg?
And that old-timer will tell you every time,
That badass bird, I Am!
I Am.

Hector Velazquez, 32,

Caesar Julius’s Cocker

 

W
e release the birds and they high-step and prance—through the slash of gaffs, which strobe the lights, I see a police who looks so much like the man who took Miguel away after he knifed that
jefe
in the Ponchatoula strawberry patch, that no-paying liar who made slaves of us both—stabbed him as Caesar now stabs his foe, the bird falling and turning away, so we handlers rush into the
gallodrome
to separate them and the other cocker slips Caesar’s blade out his bird’s heart, which bursts in throbs, his life only worth the making of small puddles in the sawdust, and the policeman is in the ring now holding us together, his stick in my back—tomorrow if we bring our cocks to fight, a thing which is true to their own fowl nature, he will arrest us, send me home to Guadalajara or to his pen where my brother spent his last years having to stick and stab to stay alive, a pen like Caesar has never known—he strikes my wrist and I drop Caesar and the other bird falls on him, jabs his gaff into Caesar’s neck, the two joined now forever in death, and a metallic clanging erupts on the bleachers, these men with money to win and lose press in on me—these cracker and coonass and cowboy alike—crowd against me to see which dead bird has become dead bird first and they holler threats and bargains and I am outnumbered as always, their hands and heat upon me, the smell of diesel from the generators makes me woozy, sweat drips off my nose and I look up, fresh air and strings of gay lights sway in the rafters, and shouts rise like the hair on my neck, and I look down at his bird, whose eyes have gone from glass to gravy—Caesar has won,
but how much longer will he live, his eyes a dying fire burning into mine and I lift him to me and whisper,
Caesar, Caesar
, and I stroke his neck and turn to leave but the police pushes his stick in my belly, just as they stuck their stick in my brother’s arm, sending him to his final home rest, and I double over mad as a wet hen, and when that cop says, “Where you think you’re going, boy,” I reach one hand into my
penche
pants pocket to be cooled by the steel of my switchblade and pray for the courage of my brother and Caesar, to strike as
mi hermano
and
mi hermanito
both did: to stab and stick, to kill and die.

PART II :
CHALLENGE

A Saint and His Dragon: George v. Dragon

Outside of Silene, Libya,

299 AD

George, 23,

Soldier, Christian, & Future Saint

 

N
ine days I’ve ridden without so much as a handful of palm dates or a palmful of almonds or a bellyful of goat’s milk, when I come over the tumescent hills, swollen and rolling out to sea, to be made witness to this ancient tableau: a young girl in billowing silk skirts fastened by her wrists to the twisted branches of a thick olive tree; behind her a dragon, dry brown scales dull in this dim light, smoke in curlicues rising from its snout and open mouth. My manroot rises and strains against this armor—God has summoned me to this mission, I have no doubt, to save this lady’s flesh from the foul unholy beast and to spread His holy word to the people of this land, stunned ignorant by the pagan laws of Rome, and I know this urge in my loins is yet another challenge the Lord’s laid before me, another desire to drive mortal man mad—how easy a task must that be?—as a child in Palestine I’d grind myself into turtle shells or frog mouths or doughy mounds of barley and exhaust myself there until Father, disgusted and distraught, sold me to the Roman army and I became a soldier designed for slaughter until the One True God showed me the light and grace of Jesus and His body in my mouth and His blood on my tongue—still these temptations swell and rise and burst about me and even so I advance, the wind and blood roaring in my ears like Satan’s locusts come to deafen me, yet I advance all the more swiftly, charge straight into its eyes, black and cold and empty—its forked tongue flickers venomous and its wings spread wide and it spits flames that char my shield, which does not betray me, and still I come forward and slam my lance,
which shatters against this creep’s deep breast, and I’m thrown from my mount.

Once as a new soldier in Diocletian’s cavalry, I became so frail that I fell from my mount and landed in a pile of barley hay and the smell overcame me—the fields of my youth, where I copulated with earthen bowls of grain and the still-warm side of a sacrificed lamb—here again I find myself aroused and the ache of my manhood plows facedown in the earth, the wind blows under my steel skin, and I rush at the dragon, which rears on its hind legs, and I drive my sword hilt-deep into its lovely groin and I release again and flee:
Oh Lord, look upon me not with scorn but with pity and call my name once more to ring among the hallowed halls of Heaven
.