Cabeza de Vaca was one of the first Spaniards
to travel through South Texas and on over through Mexico
back to the Spanish civilization.
It was all a mistake.
He was shipwrecked, of course.
But he had a rather rough time of it.
I believe he spent seven or eight years wandering
in the wilderness.
He's always been a fascinating figure in history to me.
"Cabeza de Vaca" means the head of a cow.
And it's another story, really, but that name
was handed down to him.
And it is-- this idea of the head
of a cow is used in the poem.
And I often wondered the strange sight
of this Spaniard wandering through complete wilderness,
and the Indians had never seen a white man before.
"What could they do at the sight of the man,
thrashing, lunging through thickets, the head of a cow,
and bleeding from every pore, but fall back astounded,
sharpen their arrows?
From the reeds, they watched him stop, clutch at his throat,
stare into the sun, and groan.
Birds pulled his hair, the rivers had no directions.
Some took him in to ease the gods, sat amazed at his stupor.
Others peppered the beast with arrows.
But for him, truly beside himself,
alone, there was no difference, but to pull himself from thorn
to thorn, following the maid that
lured him, golden shoed and blouse open,
from horizon to horizon.
And at last, every night as the Earth
rose black with its calls to devour him,
to lie back ready to be eaten, to bathe his tongue,
and slip into the mud."