We rolled through Sinaloa in a native bus. We had no way
to earn trust but to exist. So we watched out the windows, and slept to the organic
sound of clucking chickens and laughing babies, rocking with the cracked highways
headed South.
Dream: we found ourselves on shifting earthen paint, creatures of
a bleeding canvas.
Puerto Vallarta swimming among the tourists with no acceptance.
Urban wandering in Guadalajara, gazing at rushed architecture and
shadow streets and mercantile stalls where the intruders were not in the know.
Roadside stops for cart tacos and Coca Cola.
Meeting an alley friend in midnight Oaxaca,
greeting us with danger,
“Muy peligroso, señores.”
The rooftop dogs react to us,
barking in staccato phrases of Mexican death and restrained ancient hate.
The ROOM at the Hotel Pombo welcoming us home.
As Priests we sought the ancient paths between pyramids.
With pupils dilated, crawling through the total tunnel darkness, a fear that the spiders will find the purchase of bare skin. Boda bags at the ready.
Why the random cactus pricks while hiking on the elevated
mountain of these godlike men?
Why would the Master Weaver befriend the astral gringos to teach his family the scents of GRINGO?
Sitting on a Teotitlán del Valle roof while drinking from a plastic jug, homemade mezcal
burning up the distance to the north. We have traveled as pilgrims, with the intention
of AHORA.
The wonder of sewage basketball; playing with children.
Sharing our strong drink, in a drunken frolic, with a grizzled donkey,
the moon watches, anticipating.
The Monte Alban sweat, the mole negro, the distressed hole-in-the-wall mannequins
taunting tourists, the torture of Garci Crespa at the center of the Plaza.
Little boys thrusting their chiclets at tanned travelers, the desperate street clashes ending
in defiant yelps of “QUESA Diiiillas!”
The secret mezcalerías where Californians face life or death encounters, only to be resolved with silent
drinking prowess, then to birth the gift of language which spawns acceptance and mirth.
On a rocking mountain train drinking cheap lowbrow tequila, somewhere outside of Tepic.
(There is ham and flan in first class
while we gaze at madrones.)
Terminus, Mexicali.
Crossing back into the United States with backpacks, illegally.