Zippered Flesh 2: More Tales of Body Enhancements Gone Bad
“For thirteen days, the People had celebrated with banquets and sacrifices, dancing and games. Trade goods and tribute came from every province, from the small coastal villages to the remote settlements in the cloud-forests. The marketplace bustled with activity. Artisans demonstrated their crafts, displayed and sold their wares. Poets, speech-givers, and riddle-makers entertained the crowds. For thirteen days, travelers had come to the Temple of Kuk, which climbed skyward in a stepped pyramid to a high platform where rayed- and serpentine-engraved stelae marked the calendrical and astrological positions of the sun. For thirteen days, ritual bloodletting was done, stingray spines or threads-of-thorns piercing lips, ears, cheeks, and tongues, the heels of new infants, the foreskins of boys becoming men, the labia of girls becoming women. The scarlet drops fell upon corn paper, which was then burned to let the wafting smoke carry these offerings of nourishment and devotion to the gods.Fo...r thirteen days, the Hom, the sacred ball court with its high walls and stone rings, had resounded with the whack and thud of pokatok.MoreLess
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