She does not hunt. She waits.
In Mexican folk devotion, Santa Muerte is the Holy Death, the one saint who turns no one away. The poor and the powerful bring her the same gifts: roses, candles, a little light against the dark.
Here she crouches at the edge of a garden at midnight, her shoulders draped in old lace, crowned with flowers that will not outlive the night. One hand rises to her face, not to hide but to listen. A lantern burns at her feet. Petals already lie on the earth like a path that leads one way only.
She is not the end of the tale. She is the one who knows how every tale ends, and stays with you anyway.
Memento mori: remember that you will die. Remember, too, that someone will hold the light.
From the Santa Muerte series, shot in the artist's garden in the summer of 2020, entirely in camera. The roses return six years later with Death, the fourth Horseman of Episode II.
(Fine Art Photography. Created in July 2020.)
