“El ocaso llega, el agua dormida
Hay en el ambiente silencio de ermite
La tarde está triste porque estoy sin ti,”
el marinero’s voice perfumed the air
with the glissade of that sad bolero:
scent of ocean brine mixed con pura mamey.
On the beach, solito, borracho and al garete
he took another swig of Bacardi, plopped
himself on the sand and sang out to the waves,
“Y llora mi alma porque te perdí
Toda la tristeza brota en mí existir
Dándole a mi vida ansias de morir…”
The tremolo of that last dying word
reverberated across the water…the bay
pitched and rolled, responding with a
gracious beauty-queen-on-parade wave
as though singing the refrain,
“Y a puro la prueba del dolor cobarde
Para seguir soñando con la tarde
Para seguir soñando con la tarde…”
Right on cue, he passed out
to keep dreaming with the afternoon
just like that song of his said.
A squadron of pelicans glode by.
The waves purred at his feet
He looked like Gulliver
I felt like one of the Lilliputians
I sat al cantio de un gallo
witnessing the entire scene
bregando como capo to blend
in with the lavender shrubs
and the dunes…
I mean, what?
He was guapissimo
and had me completely
enchulada but just as I was
screwing up to courage to get
a closer look, suddenly
I felt calofrios… the skin on
my arms tried to fly away
like a flock of geese
Something was very fucking wrong.
She rose from the sea
graceful as a dolphin
wearing seven skirts
of blue and white
peacock feathers
lined their fringes
her pelo liso blowing
like a bolt of black silk
on the wings of the wind
A full moon rose in her smile
lightning bolts shot from her eyes
her hands were seaweed
her ears seashells
Her hips undulating
in anticipation of lapping
on the shore of him.
The sky darkened its brow
knitting the gathering clouds
frowning its disapproval
their pall was a death shroud,
“No, Negrita, no!! No con ese cabrón…”
She blew the clouds un besito
daring them to resist her, but
they relented, a gentle rain
improvised a rivulet ballet
she wrapped the mist
around her like a bridal veil
the sleepy sun was startled into waking.
“Nena, que carajo es esto?”
and tried to burn the enchantress’s veil away
Those rays through the drops made the air
shimmer like a skein of diadems, I shivered
when I realized, my abuelita way back in the day
was right – a sunshower really does mean
la bruja is getting married…
Closed Captioned For The Thinking Impaired 