Cuernavaca 1972
J. Quinn Brisben 11 JUL 2003
(from a version 1st conceived 28 NOV 1968)
Sol becoming sombre in the late
Morelos afternoon as the shine boy
With the huaraches made from tires
Of local manufacture goes among
The cantina tables; he sees my
Scuffed boots, I nod and look up
To the mural on the old palace wall
Where on an embedded column
Diego Rivera, using old tricks,
Has made the eyes of Cortez
Appear to follow us everywhere.
Maybe Malcolm Lowry sat here
Thirty-two years ago invoking
This place by re-imagining it
So brilliantly that the town where
His drunkard moved toward doom
Exists in parallax with this one.
There are people here who recall
Him drunk but no one ever seems
To recall him writing; artists make
Their own legends: Rivera’s huge
Appetites, the slavish vision that made
Siqueiros back up the road spray
Trotsky’s villa with machine gun fire;
Both of them, and Lowry too,
As arrogant as staring Cortez.
I drink in the classic manner; tequila
Con sala y limon verde, salt in
The web between thumb and forefinger,
The small lime halved neatly by a blade,
Tastes blending with the sensuous slap
Of brush and cloth on my boots.
The peso at that moment was worth
Eight cents estados unidos and I
Give him a fifty peso note with the
Image of the liberator Morelos and
Wave away the change; he says
“Cinquenta pesos para dar lustre
A las botas es muy generoso,
Muy generoso, gracias senor
Gracias patron;” everyone in
Shoe leather is a boss under
The watching eyes of Cortez.
Dead freedom fighters are honored
On fifty peso notes and even
The names of states, on crosses
Carried in processions, in the echo
Of hoofs on this very plaza;
Despite the poison we drink and think
Or the rest our bodies make us take
To ease our pain, despite arrogance
And illusions and ice picks
In the skull we shall some day
Walk equally shod and equally free;
The shadow of the palace advances
But not forever, dollars move faster
Than the feet of workers but not
Forever, the eyes of killer Cortez
Do not follow us forever.
