Summary

As Almeyda thinks about her grandmother, she recounts the older woman’s advice and wisdom that she would impart. She wonders if she escaped but contemplates that “even if they / captured her and took her back, they / wouldn’t know the mystic from the poet / from the clown [and] she’d have her games / with them” (110). Her grandmother was a Mohammedan who pretended to be a Christian. The narrator continues to imagine conversations with Anninho. She tells her husband that she “want[s] to be as necessary as [his] blood” but he refutes her desire (111). He tells her that she should not let anyone mean that much to her either. Almeyda dreamed again that she was making feathers, but this time she knew that the feathers were meant for Anninho. After she saw the “brave Palmaristas, / jumping from cliffs...