Sand I’m writing this amongst a week spent in Mexico. Due to circumstances beyond my control, this week is spent in a repulsively gentrified, American, catered tourist resort near Cancun. I slept utterly through the flight here. Partly due to the fact that I had slept a cumulative two hours in the past two days, one of them on the bus to the protest in DC, one of them on the way back, and partly due to the fact that I slip into slumber unfazed by my exterior. It doesn’t need to be dark out; Nay, exactly the opposite. I hope to become nocturnal one day when my hours aren’t invaded by schedules, because white light makes me weary but night madness surges in my veins. It doesn’t need to be quiet either; to the contrary, I invariably catch sleep with the aid of music. And not necessarily relaxing music, mind you. One of my favorite soporifics is Lou Reed’s enigmatic album “Metal Machine Music”, which consists solely of 60 minutes of discordant guitar feedback. A few flexible critics heralded it as brilliant, but not a one went so far as to call it even remotely listenable. Most, in fact, went so far as to wager that no one will ever listen to it all the way through. I am glad to prove them wrong; I relish its subtle, mellow matrices of cacophony. I don’t even need a bed or ample horizontal space to sleep. In school I regularly sleep during my free periods in cramped sofa-chairs, or on top of and under hardwood benches. I often get to sleep much more quickly with my head up against a cold windowpane of an automobile or airplane than I do in my own bed. The only thing that can put me off sleep is my interior; if my brain is stimulated, crowded with thoughts, which meditation fails to banish, then I could roll restlessly in the most sedative of settings.
While sleeping I was unaware of any change in scenery that would supposedly occur after I stepped off the plane. I was only aware of whatever worlds within a world were forming in my psyche, only to be annihilated by overbearing reality once the announcement that we would soon land had cleared my ears.
I advocate the endless search for truth (physical or mental truths, or mental or physical searches?) even though I believe it can only be found within, revealed in the garbled language of irony and surrealism. And once it is understood, may it in the very same instance be experienced and forgotten, and the poet’s journey be perpetuated.
The hotel was called El Faro. The Lighthouse, in English, named after a lighthouse, sure enough, which blinked in circles all night long like an inquisitive phallus. It rested on Playa del Carmen, beach of blank sands, washing waves rinsing shores, serene ocean.
It was a family resort. And, most queerly, a majority of these families appeared to be from Minnesota. I heard their small talk in between congregations of lounge-chairs, distinguishable accents exchanging indistinguishably, “Oh, where are you from?” “Oh, Minnesota,” “Oh, why, us too,” “Oh, how interesting”… I had witnessed such an anomalous coincidence of demography once before, when I was hiking one summer in New Hampshire, beloved state of hobos, and saw during the day no less than 20 families of Hasidic Jews. I thought it might be explained that there was a tour group there on that particular day, but next year I returned to that same gorge, and, sure enough, it was still inundated by those Hasidic families, men with bouncy curls, women in shawls, both sexes wearing traditional garb that looked painfully hot in the oppressive summer heat.
It was a family resort. Quite a few small children dashed about, androgynous, flat-chested, wearing, if anything, white underpants soaked to the point of transparency, their bodies caked with the hydrophilic agony of sand. And to these children were plenty of parents, the husbands predominantly stiff, overweight Caucasians, whereas the wives were more often than not very lean, demure, and I would have pitied them for poor choice if they didn’t seem so alive, tanned, burning, bold, exposed, in bikinis… or without.
It was a family resort. But for these wives it was a vacation, it was a foreign country, it was a gasping escape from puritanical dictates of decency and suppressive separation of fair flesh from fresh air. And so they bore it all, they sliced their swim attire into halves, unstrapped the top of their two pieces and tossed it to the dusty ground, and downsized the bottom of the two pieces until only cunt and asscrack remained covered. They populated the beach not sparsely, reading, accepting unadulterated rays of light into their skin, rubbing creamy sunblock seductively about their plump breasts and unleashed nipples, indulging in wet salt splashing their breasts with white-crested waves, and then emerging from the water like mermaids, sea nymphs, Kalypsos…
Meanwhile I sat in a lounge chair, my indifferent lethargy broken only by the insights of Karl Marx as I paged through Das Kapital, and by indulgence in the sight of the maternal nymphs experiencing an ephemeral return of youth to their flabby limbs. I wished I had breasts that I might liberate them too. I wished the liberators were nearer to my own age that I might reap the conquests of liberty, but as it was a young man living faster than dying, surrounded by asexual children still being born and aging women on their way out. And so these sights were pleasing, but frustrating. I didn’t stay beached for periods too lengthy; sooner or later I would snap out of the pulsing inertia of waves breaking shores, as pacifying as a yogic drumbeat, a universal rhythm, the breath of life and vocalization of “om”. I would cross to the other side of the hotel and step onto Fifth Ave, the main street of the town.
I love the city. I am an urban junkie. The convergence of culture and separated cohabitation of multitudes emits an unmistakable, indispensable, flourishing buzz, which satiates and nourishes my soul. And I love walking the streets, my face hard as stone, my blonde mane swinging lightly, potently after my firm steps, my apparel as colorful as the rainbow itself. On Fifth Ave I saw many Mexicans, which, unfortunately yet predictably, were oddly enough absent from the beach resort teeming with tourists, save for a few employees who delivered piña coladas and transported lounge-chairs, and a few Mayan women who traversed the shores with woven bands around their arm and a baby in a papoose around their back, making lingering, disillusioned offers to all sunbathers in their path. Fifth Ave’s sidewalks were lined with Mexicans, all of whom wanted to sell me something. “Mexican food, mariscos,” “Hey, guy, check my store,” “T-shirts, I have t-shirts,” “You wanna get some pot?” Despite my abhorrence for capitalism and its evil agent consumerism, I like to shop for clothes of the trippiest variety. And there were innumerable displays of such, but I couldn’t stand the ubiquitous cat calls. I felt I now knew the predicament of attractive women in high heels surrounded by construction workers. But no, I was a potential consumer, with US money, more desired in the commercial world than anything, competed for by tasteless cat calls, insidious advertising. Just like bucks bang antlers, it’s capitalist testosterone in action. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t not respond to the direct inquiries, but it hurt to shake my head no, or to say no thanks, or to even make eye contact. It felt like running a gauntlet, sexually assaulted at every step. I turned off Main Street at the end of the block, hoping to escape the tourist trap of death. I thought to pop into a restaurant. I eyed the first menu I came across. At once the maitre d’ was upon me. She was most aesthetically pleasing. Rather tall, very thin, well-cut body, blonde hair tied back in a tight ponytail. Skin without blemishes, quite brilliant, shining in the sun, tan striking a resonant harmony with the sweltering heat; impossible to tell whether she was Caucasian or Hispanic—indubitably she was both. She asked me if I would like to come in. I was cornered. As I scrutinized the menu a troupe of mariachis drew near the entrance. She told them they were just on time, and turned her attention back to me. I asked if they had anything vegetarian. Yes, she told me, salad… tamales… vegetables… she gets that question all the time, they would take good care of me. Plus, they had live music, and a garden they were becoming quite famous for. Perhaps I had heard of them? I couldn’t resist. And by that I don’t mean that her offers were insatiable. I mean I just wasn’t able to resist, as if I had been shoved inside. I didn’t find any items on the menu devoid of meat that might fill me, so I ordered two vegetarian appetizers that didn’t sound particularly enticing, but would do. I also ordered a cuzimal, a drink prepared from strawberry, pineapple, and chaya, a Mayan fruit endemic to the region. It was very sweet and melodious, cold, and stuffed with ice cubes. I heard the trio of mariachis harmonizing and strumming their guitars, singing spirited Mexican folk tunes. It sounded very nice. They swept across the room, serenading one table at a time, until they confronted mine. “Un canción, amigo?” The lead guitarist asked. “Sure,” I nodded. I used to take Spanish in school. I was told I had an impeccable accent. But this past year the administration would not let me take three languages, explaining that they wanted to produce “well-rounded” students, and that it was unwise to specialize in a certain field of learning too early in the game. So I stuck with Latin and Ancient Greek. And now I was self-conscious about my accent. It was deplorable when I gave one-word answers. I couldn’t switch immediately from English to Spanish. If I spoke complete sentences I was fine, and I wanted to speak, have conversations beyond the limits of my dwindling vocabulary, but I didn’t have the opportunity. I had nothing to say.
They asked me how I wanted it. “Allegre? Romantico?”
“Allegre,” I replied in an accent that sounded like a cross between Italy and New Jersey. They didn’t seem to hear me, and continued to look at me expectantly. “Allegre,” I repeated. Now their anticipation turned to confusion. “No lo entendí.” And so I said again, as clearly as possible, “Allegre”, and this time they understood, and began to play a song happily about going to Cozumel to pick up one’s girlfriend. It sounded very nice. I sat in my seat. I tried to look pleased. I tried not to look at them, however, because that would be unbearably awkward. They played for a few minutes. My ears were pleased, but my inside tore itself apart. As time ticked, my heart beat, and the tempo clicked, I worried that my smile would warp itself into some sort of unsightly monstrosity. At long last, the ditty was over, and I clapped my hands, joined by a few other listening patrons. They let their guitars fall to their sides, and stood silently next to my table for a few seconds until I realized that they expected some money. I searched through my pockets, handed them 20 Pesos, thanked them, and the thought screamed through my brain: They’re not musicians, they’re salesman! They’re whores! Everyone! Whores! The shopkeepers! The shoppers! The tourists! Amerika! Politicians! The system! The fat fathers! The tempting mothers! Even the naked children, budding prostitutes!
I sucked up the rest of my cuzimal in one elongated, sensational sip. My tongue tingled for a second, and then it was gone. I chomped each of the ice cubes into tiny melting pieces, one by one. I felt a kinship with these ice cubes. We were both disappearing. The moment we are exposed to warmth, we disintegrate. I couldn’t wait to be rendered a pile of dust, and be slowly blown by the stagnant winds into a swirling fantasy, and fall into place amongst the fine light sand of the beach, where I would cling desperately to the blistered toes of naked maternity and the blistered crust of Mother Earth.