[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
Dean s
sweaty arm. She yammered in Indian. Ah yes, ah yes, dear one, said Dean
tenderly and
almost sadly. He got out of the car and went fishing around in the battered
trunk in the
back the same old tortured American trunk and pulled out a wristwatch. He
showed it
to the child. She whimpered with glee. The others crowded around with
amazement.
Then Dean poked in the little girl s hand for the sweetest and purest and
smallest crystal
she has personally picked from the mountain for me. He found one no bigger
than a
berry. And he handed her the wristwatch dangling. Their mouths rounded like
the mouths
of chorister children. The lucky little girl squeezed it to her ragged
breastrobes. They
stroked Dean and thanked him. He stood among them with his ragged face to the
sky,
looking for the next and highest and final pass, and seemed like the Prophet
that had
come to them. He got back in the car. They hated to see us go. For the
longest time, as we
mounted a straight pass, they waved and ran after us. We made a turn and
never saw
them again, and they were still running after us. Ah, this breaks my heart!
cried Dean,
punching his chest. How far do they carry out these loyalties and wonders!
What s
Page 352
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
going to happen to them? Would they try to follow the car all the way to
Mexico City if
we drove slow enough?
Yes, I said, for I knew.
We came into the dizzying heights of the Sierra Madre Oriental. The banana
trees
gleamed golden in the haze. Great fogs yawned beyond stone walls along the
precipice.
Below, the Moctezuma was a thin golden thread in a green jungle mat. Strange
crossroad
towns on top of the world rolled by, with shawled Indians watching us from
under
hatbrims and rebozos. Life was dense, dark, ancient. They watched Dean,
serious and
insane at his raving wheel, with eyes of hawks. All had their hands
outstretched. They
had come down from the back mountains and higher places to hold forth their
hands for
something they thought civilization could offer, and they never dreamed the
sadness and
the poor broken delusion of it. They didn t know that a bomb had come that
could crack
all our bridges and roads and reduce them to jumbles, and we would be as poor
as they
someday, and stretching out our hands in the same, same way. Our broken Ford,
old
thirties upgoing America Ford, rattled through them and vanished in dust.
We had reached the approaches of the last plateau. Now the sun was golden,
the air keen
blue, and the desert with its occasional rivers a riot of sandy, hot space
and sudden
Biblical tree shade. Now Dean was sleeping and Stan driving. The shepherds
appeared,
dressed as in first times, in long flowing robes, the women carrying golden
bundles of
flax, the men staves.
Under great trees on the shimmering desert the shepherds sat and convened,
and the
Page 353
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
sheep moiled in the sun and raised dust beyond. Man, man, I yelled to Dean,
wake up
and see the shepherds, wake up and see the golden world that Jesus came from,
with your
own eyes you can tell!
He shot his head up from the seat, saw one glimpse of it all in the fading
red sun, and
dropped back to sleep. When he woke up he described it to me in detail and
said, Yes,
man, I m glad you told me to look. Oh, Lord, what shall I do? Where will I
go? He
rubbed his belly, he looked to heaven with red eyes, he almost wept.
The end of our journey impended. Great fields stretched on both sides of us;
a noble wind
blew across the occasional immense tree grove s and over old missions turning
salmon
pink in the late sun. The clouds were close and huge and rose. Mexico City
by dusk!
We d made it, a total of nineteen hundred miles from the afternoon yards of
Denver to
these vast and Biblical areas of the world, and now we were about to reach
the end of the
road.
Shall we change our insect T-shirts?
Naw, let s wear them into town, hell s bells. And we drove into Mexico
City.
A brief mountain pass took us suddenly to a height from which we saw all of
Mexico
City stretched out in its volcanic crater below and spewing city smokes and
early
dusklights. Down to it we zoomed, down Insurgentes Boulevard, straight toward
the heart
of town at Reforma. Kids played soccer in enormous sad fields and threw up
dust. Taxidrivers
overtook us and wanted to know if we wanted girls. No, we didn t want girls
now.
Long, ragged adobe slums stretched out on the plain; we saw lonely figures in
the
dimming alleys. Soon night would come. Then the city roared in and suddenly
Page 354
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
we were
passing crowded cafes and theaters and many lights. Newsboys yelled at us.
Mechanics
slouched by, barefoot, with wrenches and rags. Mad barefoot Indian drivers
cut across us
and surrounded us and tooted and made frantic traffic. The noise was
incredible. No
mufflers are used on Mexican cars. Horns are batted with glee continual.
Whee! yelled
Dean,
Look out! He staggered the car through the traffic and played with
everybody. He
drove like an Indian. He got on a circular glorietta drive on Reforma
Boulevard and
rolled around it with its eight spokes shooting cars at us from all
directions, left, right,
izquierda, dead ahead, and yelled and jumped with joy. This is traffic I ve
always
dreamed of Everybody goes. An ambulance came balling through. American
ambulances dart and weave through traffic with siren blowing; the great
world-wide
Fellahin Indian ambulances merely come through at eighty miles an hour in the
city
streets, and everybody just has to get out of the way and they don t pause
for anybody or
any circumstances and fly straight through. We saw it reeling out of sight on
skittering
wheels in the breaking- up moil of dense downtown traffic. The drivers were
Indians.
People, even old ladies, ran for buses that never stopped. Young Mexico City
businessmen made bets and ran by squads for buses and athletically jumped
them. The
bus-drivers were barefoot, sneering and insane, and sat low and squat in
T-shirts at the
low, enormous wheels. Ikons burned over them. The lights in the buses were
brown and
greenish, and dark faces were lined on wooden benches.
In downtown Mexico City thousands of hipsters in floppy straw hats and long-
lapeled
Page 355
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
jackets over bare chests padded along the main drag, some of them selling
crucifixes and
weed in the alleys, some of them kneeling in beat chapels next to Mexican
burlesque
shows in sheds. Some alleys were rubble, with open sewers, and little doors
led to closetsize
bars stuck in adobe walls. You had to jump over a ditch to get your drink,
and in the
bottom of the ditch was the ancient lake of the Aztec. You came out of the
bar with your
back to the wall and edged back to the street. They served coffee mixed with
rum and
nutmeg. Mambo blared from everywhere. Hundreds of whores lined themselves
along the
dark and narrow streets and their sorrowful eyes gleamed at us in the night.
We wandered
in a frenzy and a dream. We ate beautiful steaks for forty-eight cents in a
strange tiled [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl freetocraft.keep.pl
Dean s
sweaty arm. She yammered in Indian. Ah yes, ah yes, dear one, said Dean
tenderly and
almost sadly. He got out of the car and went fishing around in the battered
trunk in the
back the same old tortured American trunk and pulled out a wristwatch. He
showed it
to the child. She whimpered with glee. The others crowded around with
amazement.
Then Dean poked in the little girl s hand for the sweetest and purest and
smallest crystal
she has personally picked from the mountain for me. He found one no bigger
than a
berry. And he handed her the wristwatch dangling. Their mouths rounded like
the mouths
of chorister children. The lucky little girl squeezed it to her ragged
breastrobes. They
stroked Dean and thanked him. He stood among them with his ragged face to the
sky,
looking for the next and highest and final pass, and seemed like the Prophet
that had
come to them. He got back in the car. They hated to see us go. For the
longest time, as we
mounted a straight pass, they waved and ran after us. We made a turn and
never saw
them again, and they were still running after us. Ah, this breaks my heart!
cried Dean,
punching his chest. How far do they carry out these loyalties and wonders!
What s
Page 352
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
going to happen to them? Would they try to follow the car all the way to
Mexico City if
we drove slow enough?
Yes, I said, for I knew.
We came into the dizzying heights of the Sierra Madre Oriental. The banana
trees
gleamed golden in the haze. Great fogs yawned beyond stone walls along the
precipice.
Below, the Moctezuma was a thin golden thread in a green jungle mat. Strange
crossroad
towns on top of the world rolled by, with shawled Indians watching us from
under
hatbrims and rebozos. Life was dense, dark, ancient. They watched Dean,
serious and
insane at his raving wheel, with eyes of hawks. All had their hands
outstretched. They
had come down from the back mountains and higher places to hold forth their
hands for
something they thought civilization could offer, and they never dreamed the
sadness and
the poor broken delusion of it. They didn t know that a bomb had come that
could crack
all our bridges and roads and reduce them to jumbles, and we would be as poor
as they
someday, and stretching out our hands in the same, same way. Our broken Ford,
old
thirties upgoing America Ford, rattled through them and vanished in dust.
We had reached the approaches of the last plateau. Now the sun was golden,
the air keen
blue, and the desert with its occasional rivers a riot of sandy, hot space
and sudden
Biblical tree shade. Now Dean was sleeping and Stan driving. The shepherds
appeared,
dressed as in first times, in long flowing robes, the women carrying golden
bundles of
flax, the men staves.
Under great trees on the shimmering desert the shepherds sat and convened,
and the
Page 353
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
sheep moiled in the sun and raised dust beyond. Man, man, I yelled to Dean,
wake up
and see the shepherds, wake up and see the golden world that Jesus came from,
with your
own eyes you can tell!
He shot his head up from the seat, saw one glimpse of it all in the fading
red sun, and
dropped back to sleep. When he woke up he described it to me in detail and
said, Yes,
man, I m glad you told me to look. Oh, Lord, what shall I do? Where will I
go? He
rubbed his belly, he looked to heaven with red eyes, he almost wept.
The end of our journey impended. Great fields stretched on both sides of us;
a noble wind
blew across the occasional immense tree grove s and over old missions turning
salmon
pink in the late sun. The clouds were close and huge and rose. Mexico City
by dusk!
We d made it, a total of nineteen hundred miles from the afternoon yards of
Denver to
these vast and Biblical areas of the world, and now we were about to reach
the end of the
road.
Shall we change our insect T-shirts?
Naw, let s wear them into town, hell s bells. And we drove into Mexico
City.
A brief mountain pass took us suddenly to a height from which we saw all of
Mexico
City stretched out in its volcanic crater below and spewing city smokes and
early
dusklights. Down to it we zoomed, down Insurgentes Boulevard, straight toward
the heart
of town at Reforma. Kids played soccer in enormous sad fields and threw up
dust. Taxidrivers
overtook us and wanted to know if we wanted girls. No, we didn t want girls
now.
Long, ragged adobe slums stretched out on the plain; we saw lonely figures in
the
dimming alleys. Soon night would come. Then the city roared in and suddenly
Page 354
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
we were
passing crowded cafes and theaters and many lights. Newsboys yelled at us.
Mechanics
slouched by, barefoot, with wrenches and rags. Mad barefoot Indian drivers
cut across us
and surrounded us and tooted and made frantic traffic. The noise was
incredible. No
mufflers are used on Mexican cars. Horns are batted with glee continual.
Whee! yelled
Dean,
Look out! He staggered the car through the traffic and played with
everybody. He
drove like an Indian. He got on a circular glorietta drive on Reforma
Boulevard and
rolled around it with its eight spokes shooting cars at us from all
directions, left, right,
izquierda, dead ahead, and yelled and jumped with joy. This is traffic I ve
always
dreamed of Everybody goes. An ambulance came balling through. American
ambulances dart and weave through traffic with siren blowing; the great
world-wide
Fellahin Indian ambulances merely come through at eighty miles an hour in the
city
streets, and everybody just has to get out of the way and they don t pause
for anybody or
any circumstances and fly straight through. We saw it reeling out of sight on
skittering
wheels in the breaking- up moil of dense downtown traffic. The drivers were
Indians.
People, even old ladies, ran for buses that never stopped. Young Mexico City
businessmen made bets and ran by squads for buses and athletically jumped
them. The
bus-drivers were barefoot, sneering and insane, and sat low and squat in
T-shirts at the
low, enormous wheels. Ikons burned over them. The lights in the buses were
brown and
greenish, and dark faces were lined on wooden benches.
In downtown Mexico City thousands of hipsters in floppy straw hats and long-
lapeled
Page 355
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
jackets over bare chests padded along the main drag, some of them selling
crucifixes and
weed in the alleys, some of them kneeling in beat chapels next to Mexican
burlesque
shows in sheds. Some alleys were rubble, with open sewers, and little doors
led to closetsize
bars stuck in adobe walls. You had to jump over a ditch to get your drink,
and in the
bottom of the ditch was the ancient lake of the Aztec. You came out of the
bar with your
back to the wall and edged back to the street. They served coffee mixed with
rum and
nutmeg. Mambo blared from everywhere. Hundreds of whores lined themselves
along the
dark and narrow streets and their sorrowful eyes gleamed at us in the night.
We wandered
in a frenzy and a dream. We ate beautiful steaks for forty-eight cents in a
strange tiled [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]