disconcerting

somewhere in the world a man is travelling at the speed of light to make his life. make a life. make life. make.

memory

sometimes, just sitting on my sofa, i can smell him alongside steak, sea-salt, mountain air and good things.

buenos aires midnight

internal courtyard. pouring rain. rain pouring down the walls. back against a window sill. single drop running down a breast. hand pressing against the small of a back. water running down the contour of a spine. fingernails digging into shoulder flesh. arms round a neck. eyes closed. rain pouring down. down the walls.

tone

he delivers instructions with precision and without hysterics. i don't feel patronised. i do as i'm told.

punta del este, minas, tacuarembo, salto

the lobby
arm on the table, hand holding the paper steady, head tilted on this arm, other arm active, writing. eyes falling shut. words getting blurry. arm active, writing. head tilted. world passing by. 90 degree angle. world watching writer. head tilted. eyes closing. arm active. writing. map passing by. children passing by. fat blokes and their skinny girlfriends passing by. 90 degrees. head tilted. arm asleep. arm active. words blurry. writing.

the cricket
you sit on a bed in a hotel in the smi-dark. wondering what are the things that you should be thinking about and why you aren't thinking them. the trouble with going with the flow is that you have to remember not to swim against the current. a cricket chirps away, making sense. a tap drips. an american breathes in and out. writing produces no answers.

the ride
he sets the horse for me and off we go. towards the cows, then the lamb, then the sunset. galloping away. the sky is red and blue and grey and blue and red and grey and all the other colours you can think the sky will be around sunset. and a few more. the sky surrounds everything. the land surrounds everything. we can see for miles. dark comes in. i'm on the horse. invincible. he knows the way. the horses know the way. there is nothing to worry about. we get back in the dark and the path is lined with fireflies. stars of the land, flickering. later he reads me a story about another ride. ride away. that's what i'll do when i'm good and ready.

the sting
i'm driving to salto, on the 31 east-west. which i've never done. which i've never ever done. i'm doing well, i think. slow, fast, overtake, watch for the potholes, end in sight. salto is near. doing good. 120. keep going. nearly there. bang! an evil insect flies into the car and stings me in the neck. right next to my mole. if it's a bee, my neck will swell up and i can already feel my mouth getting numb...

effort

when asking for directions

• listen
• understand
• remember

it's a simple expectation...

trust

he cleaned a smudge off my chin, and the ease and intimacy of the gesture petrified me. and i want him to do it again.

the poem

la paloma is sleepy and empty. in the cybercafe, kids relieve their boredom playing mindless games on the buzzing computers. my inbox is full to the brim with spam and bank notices and lawyers and art shows. but buried in the mess i find a poem. poem. as everybody knows here at ladelentes we hate all kinds of poetry. still, i read the poem. read the poem. and i still haven't quite managed to keep a small smile from sitting on the right-hand corner of my mouth. tickling me.

the children

Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

the children walk along the street carrying a rebenque. faces smudged with track dust. clothes tight, loose, random. eyes sparking. voices calling.

where’s your horse? i ask them.

we’re looking for two of them. they are gone, they say, don’t like the life of the city.

i ask them what the horses are called.

one of the children replies, one horse doesn’t have a name... the other child says ...and the other horse, i can’t remember.

i say that’s very strange.

they crumble into giggles.

turns out one horse is called “doesn’t have a name” the other is called “i can’t remember”.

caza-incautos.

they look at me from behind long eyelashes and dirty cheeks. and laugh at me, with me, around me and up and down. clean, clear laughter. right from the belly.

then they show us the way to the hotel through the fields and wave us goodbye.

rebenque, cogotera, fuste

we walked around the fair looking for horse-riding parafernalia. i had to explain "troglodyte" to him. fitting. he looked at me and cracked his newly acquired whip.

nape

i indulge my hands and let them caress the back of his neck, just below the hairline, as we walk along the streets of calafate, hunting for meat.

wild cows ahead

Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

the ferry ride is endless and the coffee still hasn't removed the remnants of our morning crank. the american rails against the guide, who repeats for the infinitesimal time that glaciers are made of compacted snow, that the colour depends on the density of the ice, that they are overspill from the icefield between the mountains, that the icebergs float with 80% of their size below the water level...

at the shore, we go off the beaten track, avoiding further repetition. he didn't believe there were wild cows until we found one, dead, bloated, legs up in the air, belly torn to display rotting innards, tongue lolling out, kingdom of flies...

i like that he doesn't look after me, he ploughs ahead through thorny bushes barely looking behind. he knows i'm there. this suits me fine...

later we have a 'double date' with other travellers. they don't turn up, but nonetheless more dead cows are surely eaten.

todo glaciares

Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

one dead cow is a shame. two dead cows is avian flu. run for the hills!

the american

his loud blue eyes come out of the shower proclaiming it the best there is. profound words tattooed dark on wet skin. these things i notice, wet eyes, wet skin, blue words, blue eyes, best shower, hiding behind a book, painting stories across this presence.