Leslie Marmon Silko’s short story depicts Indigenous traditions and death rites of the Laguna Pueblo people, allowing the reader insight into how Leon and his family reconcile the apparent contradictions between past and present, Pueblo custom and Christian faith. The tone of the text and the narrator’s perspective keeps the reader a respectful distance from the events of the story itself. The third-person omniscient narrator remains separate from the story, remarking and providing details of a scene from a slightly detached perspective. Though it occasionally remarks on Leon’s mood, the narrator does not provide detailed descriptions of his thoughts. At the end of the story, for example, the narrator describes how Leon “felt good because it was finished, and he was happy about the sprinkling of the holy water” (4). Through this small description, the reader understands Leon’s general feelings towards the events of the story. Silko’s narrator describes the interior worlds of the characters in shallow detail, resisting a detailed psychological portrait.

Unable to gain insight into Leon and the other characters’ internal thoughts, the reader examines their words and actions in close detail.