Men (Eagle)The 20 Maya day signsMaya Calendar

Men, the eagle, is fifteenth of the twenty, following Ix the jaguar: after enough waiting on the ground, rising to see the whole. The jaguar is the night sun; the eagle is the day sun — it flies high, sees far, and sees somewhat coldly. The Maya eagle is linked to warriors, to foresight, and to the moon goddess Ixchel (the word Men carries 'to make, to do', and also names the old woman of the moon).

So Men's mechanism is vantage and height: from above, patterns are clear, direction obvious, small things very small. Its power is foresight — you see now what others see years later; its difficulty is distance — up there, what's at your feet, what's in front of you, the warmth of people, often gets dropped.

Where you'll recognise it: you habitually zoom out, an instinct for the big direction, impatience with detail and chores, a native independence, real pain when confined to a small frame. Running well, you're the one with the longest sight: seeing the whole, showing a group the way, placing today's trouble inside a larger picture. Stuck, you drift or go cold — flying too long without landing, 'the big picture' used to excuse the small tasks, seeing clearly with no one able to follow. In the sequence Men is followed by Kib', the owl: after the day's seeing, seeing in the dark. Your next step isn't flying higher. It's coming down to tell the people on the ground what you saw.