Monday, September 5, 2011
Mariana alzamora/
Victoria took me to see don Marcelo the 'soplador', because my mother said i was out of sorts She took me without her knowing as my mother didn't believe in sourcerers, but i loved Victoria so we went to the countryside past the cattle fields to a 'caserio' we took the road with a broken down car and under a tree Don Marcelo stopped sawing wood and looked at us with blackhard eyes but he was wearing a small striped brown and purple sweater that was a woman’s. We followed him into a low ceiling cement barn, warm from the breath of the cows and the smell of dung At the other end was a weak light bulb over a dark wood table with a skull, a round stone an equilateral and equilongitud cross, a glass bowl and a ball of clay. He placed on the table the candles, cigarettes, rosewater, aguardiente and the wild flowers he asked us to bring and emptied the rosewater into the glass bowl and put in the flowers the candles he stood in pieces of soft clay and lit them then he asked me to undress and i said no so he said i could keep my slip on and gave me his back and prayed to his strange altar while i undressed and then i stood in front of him with hair that didn't want to lay flat and black eyes looking somewhere past me. He began reciting words in quechua in a lulling way and took the flowers from the bowl and touched me on the head, my face my hair my neck my body in front and in back he made me lift my foot and passed the flowers underneath one foot then the other reciting all the time his litany he then took a cigarette from the table and lit it with the candle; he inhaled and exhaled a cloud of smoke in my face and between words he inhaled and exhaled the smoke to the back oand over my head, my body in front and my body in back all the way down the front of me inhaling and blowing out he made me lift my foot one then the other inhaling and exhaling reciting his litany and then he paused looked nowhere past me and then again he began reciting in a lower pitch as he took the stone and passed it over my head and my face my ears my neck my back my front underneath one foot and then the other he paused and the silence was very loud inside me with him looking at me but nowhere then he went to the table and took the bowl with the rose water and dipped the flowers and sprinkled me all around the front and the back of my body and over my head and under each foot and his sing song was softer then he paused and went to the table and got the bottle of aguardiente and took a sip and blew it out pulverizing it holding the candle in front so that it would light an inmense flame on me this he did standing back and with a louder chant again and again all around me and over me and undeneath my feet and i was wondering if this dramatic moment was to scare me rather than what was troubling me and then the silence and then he took my hands and sucked from the palms and blowed out what he had sucked then turned to the table took the flowers and he showered me with them at that point i felt something dark leave me and i began to laugh then he said it was finished
Victoria gave him some money and three cans of bonito We were silent walking down the lane and i was surprised it was still daylight she asked me what i felt and i said nothing, that i felt nothing she said he had prayed to the elements and to beauty so that they be in harmony within me Who knows maybe he was responsible for the change that came over me once i could see i should leave Huacraruco
mariana alzamora/ interspecies comunication
I was walking down the beach upset at how dependent i had become on you, when i bent to pick a perfect, completely white spiraling shell with a cluster of perfect white barnacles on its back, ‘like our relationship’ i thought. I relaxed,
it was very beautiful
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i was walking on the white sand along the turquoise green waters asking the Sea if it loved me, if You, Earth, loved me, if you heard me, if you knew of my existence and of my love.... when i saw a moth, dead, on the hard sand; it was a subdued brown with markings in lighter or darker color. I picked it up, and i opened its wings, and to my delight a brilliant red ocre pair of wings spread open beneath the subtle wings. I kept walking thinking of the way it hid its brilliance except in flight. It took a while before i realized that this was the way the Earth answered me, the red wings had formed a perfect heart.
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Once we were driving fast along a hot empty road on which the vegetation was encroaching. We were nearing the border to Guatemala, Jean wanted to go to Guatemala. we were in Mexico and already they had told us we had to keep to the main roads as to go on secondary roads was dangerous; we could be assaulted, and i had heard on the news that people once again were being kidnapped in Guatemala and we were driving an old but elegant and very comfortable American car Jean had traded for the moon vehicle i had not wanted, and i didn't like this one either. Everything Jean did was big, open, good and daring, and he believed he was protected by his angels completely different from me who stayed at the back and never liked to be showy. So here we were flying down this road, and i saw on the telephone wires ahead, a bird and how as we came by, it decided to fly down right in front of the car, and, we hit it
Jean stop! i said. He stopped and i ran back to it and saw
it had died and flies were around him. Already? I picked him up. It weighed nothing. It was so thin i could feel its tiniest bones, so i took one feather and we buried him and i was thinking, had it committed suicide? Was he sick? why were the flies with him He had wanted to terminate his life.
Jean turned back, and we went to Guatemala by bus.
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Once i was sitting on the circular bench under the shadow of the casuarinas and looking out at the sea i saw three dolphin fins come up in the same place one after the other “They are making a circle” i thought, and decided to make out of clay the dolphin ring of joy and playfulness and one day while working in this piece i saw a dolphin swimming along the shore very close to me. and said to him “If you know i am thinking of you do something that is different to let me know“ he began to make strange motions downwards 'as if looking for fish underneath the rocks', i thought and my heart started to pump fast and i told him “If you feel me, come nearer” and as he came very close to me my heart pumped harder; I thought he would feel it through the water. I was so afraid even though i so wanted to have close contact like my friend who had jumped from his sailboat naked, with only a mask to see and swim with a pod of dolphins. At first only young curious ones would come to him, then the mother’s came and then a big male came and stayed for the longest time, looking at him eye to eye ,,,but i, i couldn't __________________________________________________________
Once upon a time my son brought home a baybe parrot, It had big rosy beak and a rosy skin so thin one could almost see the food through it. It felt too fragile to handle to be fed every four hours but he grew bigger and stronger and soon tiny spears broke through its skin, got longer and longer and soon sheaths fell out and feathers fanned out glowing green. and turquoise, yellow and milky green with lightgreen around his shiny like an apple red beak. At first they were somewhat roughly placed but in time they grew longer unified, with no end or beginning to them, so smooth and even to seem more like the iridescent butterfly’s scales “ You must be a God” i said to his black pupils with yellow and orange around. Two years later a coral colored and black ring appeared on his neck and i had to change her name from “Mimima” to “Mimimo” but his everyday name was “Baybe” He learned to say “i love you”, “what are you doing” “you are so beautiful” which he shortened to “you are so beauty” and sometimes to “you’re so beu”; we’d sing opera, a duet, he’d look for my mouth to kiss this he did especially when he sensed me tense. Because i began to leave more often and i wanted him to not miss me, on a full moon eve, i brought ”Moon” she was a fully grown Indian ring neck who grew up with other birds wild in a cage It was not love at first sight he looked at her with disgust at her terrible manners and one day he had enough and left “Baybe!” i’d call when i’d see him on the trees on the way to the beach “I got her for YOU not for me! “ He’d look at me and then fly further away. this went on for many days and one day my friend called to say he was on the tree in front of her house i went to get him but he would not come. Baybe found Cecilia’s house 2 miles down the island as Cecilia’s son Josh liked him very much and they would play together when he came to visit There was nothing i could do so i left When Cecilia called “ hes come into the house” i again went but he would not come to me and flew from curtain to curtain rod i sat down with her to talk about life as we often did. When i began to cry as my life at that time was difficult, baybe flew to me and told me he loved me that i was so beauty and looked for my mouth to kiss and we went home together
it was very beautiful
____________________________________________________________
i was walking on the white sand along the turquoise green waters asking the Sea if it loved me, if You, Earth, loved me, if you heard me, if you knew of my existence and of my love.... when i saw a moth, dead, on the hard sand; it was a subdued brown with markings in lighter or darker color. I picked it up, and i opened its wings, and to my delight a brilliant red ocre pair of wings spread open beneath the subtle wings. I kept walking thinking of the way it hid its brilliance except in flight. It took a while before i realized that this was the way the Earth answered me, the red wings had formed a perfect heart.
_______________________________________________________________
Once we were driving fast along a hot empty road on which the vegetation was encroaching. We were nearing the border to Guatemala, Jean wanted to go to Guatemala. we were in Mexico and already they had told us we had to keep to the main roads as to go on secondary roads was dangerous; we could be assaulted, and i had heard on the news that people once again were being kidnapped in Guatemala and we were driving an old but elegant and very comfortable American car Jean had traded for the moon vehicle i had not wanted, and i didn't like this one either. Everything Jean did was big, open, good and daring, and he believed he was protected by his angels completely different from me who stayed at the back and never liked to be showy. So here we were flying down this road, and i saw on the telephone wires ahead, a bird and how as we came by, it decided to fly down right in front of the car, and, we hit it
Jean stop! i said. He stopped and i ran back to it and saw
it had died and flies were around him. Already? I picked him up. It weighed nothing. It was so thin i could feel its tiniest bones, so i took one feather and we buried him and i was thinking, had it committed suicide? Was he sick? why were the flies with him He had wanted to terminate his life.
Jean turned back, and we went to Guatemala by bus.
_______________________________________________________________
Once i was sitting on the circular bench under the shadow of the casuarinas and looking out at the sea i saw three dolphin fins come up in the same place one after the other “They are making a circle” i thought, and decided to make out of clay the dolphin ring of joy and playfulness and one day while working in this piece i saw a dolphin swimming along the shore very close to me. and said to him “If you know i am thinking of you do something that is different to let me know“ he began to make strange motions downwards 'as if looking for fish underneath the rocks', i thought and my heart started to pump fast and i told him “If you feel me, come nearer” and as he came very close to me my heart pumped harder; I thought he would feel it through the water. I was so afraid even though i so wanted to have close contact like my friend who had jumped from his sailboat naked, with only a mask to see and swim with a pod of dolphins. At first only young curious ones would come to him, then the mother’s came and then a big male came and stayed for the longest time, looking at him eye to eye ,,,but i, i couldn't __________________________________________________________
Once upon a time my son brought home a baybe parrot, It had big rosy beak and a rosy skin so thin one could almost see the food through it. It felt too fragile to handle to be fed every four hours but he grew bigger and stronger and soon tiny spears broke through its skin, got longer and longer and soon sheaths fell out and feathers fanned out glowing green. and turquoise, yellow and milky green with lightgreen around his shiny like an apple red beak. At first they were somewhat roughly placed but in time they grew longer unified, with no end or beginning to them, so smooth and even to seem more like the iridescent butterfly’s scales “ You must be a God” i said to his black pupils with yellow and orange around. Two years later a coral colored and black ring appeared on his neck and i had to change her name from “Mimima” to “Mimimo” but his everyday name was “Baybe” He learned to say “i love you”, “what are you doing” “you are so beautiful” which he shortened to “you are so beauty” and sometimes to “you’re so beu”; we’d sing opera, a duet, he’d look for my mouth to kiss this he did especially when he sensed me tense. Because i began to leave more often and i wanted him to not miss me, on a full moon eve, i brought ”Moon” she was a fully grown Indian ring neck who grew up with other birds wild in a cage It was not love at first sight he looked at her with disgust at her terrible manners and one day he had enough and left “Baybe!” i’d call when i’d see him on the trees on the way to the beach “I got her for YOU not for me! “ He’d look at me and then fly further away. this went on for many days and one day my friend called to say he was on the tree in front of her house i went to get him but he would not come. Baybe found Cecilia’s house 2 miles down the island as Cecilia’s son Josh liked him very much and they would play together when he came to visit There was nothing i could do so i left When Cecilia called “ hes come into the house” i again went but he would not come to me and flew from curtain to curtain rod i sat down with her to talk about life as we often did. When i began to cry as my life at that time was difficult, baybe flew to me and told me he loved me that i was so beauty and looked for my mouth to kiss and we went home together
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