rudely interrupted by january
Sunday 6 January 2008 | I like a cookie
The mind having become that dangerous neighborhood where you shouldn’t go alone, suddenly full of those whom the Brujo calls rogues, hissing judgment, reminding me chorally of my selfishness, weaknesses, great and greatly harmful mistakes. I flail, try to make an egg custard, overcook it, fall asleep despondent with all my clothes on, nightmare, nightmare, wake up 
writing bewildered poems out of the gate, drink vegetable juice, wander the house patently mad. It has been relentless grey and autumnal, misting rain ever since we got back. Though more like October than January and it’ll be 90º again by March 1st I’m sure. In the meantime to wrassle with condemning inner voices which have no shortage of faults at which to point accusing their fingers. And I was not nearly done saying things about this world.
•
“Where are you from, Angel Juan?” Witch Baby asked.
“Mexico.”
Witch Baby had seen sugar skulls and candelabras in the shapes of doves, angels and trees. She had seen white dresses embroidered with gardens, and she had seen paintings of a dark woman with parrots and flowers and blood and one eyebrow. She liked tortillas with butter melting in the fold almost as much as candy, and she liked hot days and hibiscus flowers, mariachi bands and especially, now, Angel Juan.
Angels in Mexico might all have black hair, Witch Baby thought. I might belong there.
“What’s it like?” she asked, thinking of rose-covered saints and fountains.
“Where I’m from it’s poor. Little kids sit on the street asking for change. Some of them sing songs and play guitars they’ve made themselves, or they sell rainbow wish bracelets. There are old ladies too—just sitting in the dirt. People come from your country with lots of money and fancy clothes. They go down to the bars, 
shoot tequila and go back up to buy things. It’s crazy to see them leaving with their paper flowers and candles and blankets and stuff, like we have something they need, when most of us don’t even have a place to sleep or food to eat. Maybe they just want to come see how we live to feel better about their lives, or maybe they’re missing something else that we have.”
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