Monday, August 04, 2008

Analect 2.322x



4 August 2008. Cool gray sky, woman in beige pants suit, adroit, reaching for door of Navigator Escrow. Distant trees--a poplar and a birch. Ocean waves on broken coast.

La Quebrada. In the far northwest--almost Bolivia. The Altiplano. Two Indian boys in dark capes, woolen hats, walking to the mines. Spirit of the mountain--nor to be feared, but instead respected.

My friend Chugo, family in tow--his wife, his three daughters, posing here in the town square of Humahuaca, to the north of Tilcara and Tumbaya. Indian names, embedded--as if the hills themselves were a form of speech, un idioma de piedra...

"Y en el misterio de las quebradas, vaga la sombra de mis abuelos..."




(And in the mystery of the highlands wanders the shadow of my ancestors... Atahualpa Yupanqui)

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