images that hang in my mind

She licks her fingers as she makes my tostadas de frijol, Q1 each. I don't mind. It seems natural, as if I were in her kitchen watching her prepare us both a snack with her cat scurrying between her feet and then mine.

Yesterday, I watched a blond haired Montana boy climb off the bar stool and into his speed boat making his way down river to his home of three years: a marina inhabited be retired american sailors. I don't know him except that he is a friend of a friend and he speaks little Spanish. He will always remain distant. I have no desire to share a conversation, but as I eyed his braided blond hair, I did wonder about his internal changes. He too has been molded and de-molded by this place.

i try to watch the sunset up river when possible. i walk out to the dock by the clinic and lay down. i prefer to watch it on my side. six months ago, the scene was foriegn. i recognized a peace in the scenery, a beauty: out there. however, i couldn't internalize it. my wish was, is to absorb that scenery, to not have the stillness of the river or the warmth of the colors be untouchable like a painting that hangs on the wall of a museum. drop by drop, the hues and soft curves of the trees and clouds are entering me. in ways i don't yet understand, i am becoming less an observer and more a member, can i say participant? in the play of light and shadows, imperfect circles and rectangles. julio cortàzar writes of a mandala hanging in his insomnia, an image he focuses on while the rest of consiousness hangs off the edges of the table, the bed, the cliff that raises to create that plateu of clarity. maybe the river at sunset is my mandala.