Cardinal Points

Sparrow of Española

.:. Sparrow of Espanola Here's to that bedraggled sparrow at the Sonic Drive-In in Espanola, New Mexico, famous Low Rider Capital of the World. Sunday there is a holy day of cars; the summer afternoon we passed through all the discount auto parts stores were open, their lots full, and out on the drag a parade of huge Dodges and souped-up Chevys crept along, engines throbbing, drivers in mirrored shades just visible above the steering wheels made from chain, the carpeted dashboards, soft dice bouncing as car after car reared up and dropped down, reared and dropped like perfect black stallions in movies at El Pasatiempo down the road. Sunlight ricocheted off tinted windshields, metallic-flake paint and chrome trim as the drivers idled bumper to bumper up and down U.S. 285, route of the Pueblos, route of Escalante and Cortez, of Spanish priests, American trappers, traders, and tourists on their way somewhere else, stopping for coffee, a bite to eat, a tank of gas to get them out. In Espanola the low riders drove all afternoon, all evening, all their lives for all we knew. For half an hour 15 we ate in our car and watched them go by and go by. They were home there, with the hard-luck sparrow that accosted us at the Sonic: small, brown, skinny, half its feathers gone, others poking out at odd angles, it looked ravaged and incapable of flight, sparrow of present misery forever. Yet it flew, popping from beam to beam holding up the corrugated steel roof above us, flying about or bouncing around on the ground, peeping its one note over and over. There, out of the hot sun that bore down, crowning the cars out on the strip, softening the asphalt everywhere except in the shadow of the Sonic, was home, was the known world: cheap speakers squawking, waitresses hustling trays, overheated aroma of fries and tacos, crumbs all the sparrows fought over. Ours and the others of the flockthose bigger, less tattered, maybe not so hopelessly stuck in Espafiolawent begging shamelessly from car to car, ours and the hot machines of low riders in for a rest, a break in their ceaseless 16 revolutions up and down 285. Give them tenacity. Here's to that lost sparrow, that least bird cheeping on the hood of our car, ornament of desire that creates and defeats failure. Here's to the insistent call of its belly and heart that won our hearts and tongues: when we rolled out of the Sonic into the parade and away from Espanola forever, we were singing its song over and over and over. 17 ...