in the air of the conquistadors

The golden city Pizarro,
where was this now? At Farmacia Kennedy,
the rain came down the building’s
green face, stamped by a white cross,
the symbol for passersby, vendors,
shifting in garbage for any sort of thing.

The youth wandered diagonally
across the street, and his caretaker
followed pointing in that direction,
responding to mumbled questions
asked and answered by nothing. Needing
a machine, one to pump hot water for tea,
she couldn’t walk much more like this,
having barely stood after rising out of bed.
Her red shirt worn smelt, just as the
same socks since Saturday night,
when the day is Wednesday,
and left alone on the sidewalk.

From there he stumbled inside
a home where times fall to the
bedroom. Dreams of Diego de Almagro
were waiting down the hallway while
the Pizarro brothers remembered
drinking at a bar in Maciel, Vilcabamba;
and the Almagristas, other men
from Chile, stood idly outside the door.
But for them it was pointless
to be going on like drips of mud
inked into glass, the plans of a dumb
draughtsman, wearing shoes too tight,
teeth too dirty, and trunks
that couldn’t hold their bags.
Past them in a corner Amaru
sat, possessed by thoughts of Manco
Inca–rejected and killed
by other rejects–his judgement
tangled by the events around him.

Arguments abound with excuses
and explanations, someone mentions
Cortes or one who stayed rock-solid,
Moctezuma, convinced he
was in the presence of Quetzalcoatl;
no one needs to be told what
happened to him. The swift blur of
colors and noises, no time for anxiety,
the new deserts of consciousness
rise in the brain to level themselves
out–the pavement never dries.
Swept along, they might follow
Paullu’s example and accept wherever
the rocks settle. Everyone should know
this war is futile. Yet one can
never resist the likeness of this or that
attribute, and conversations continue
to the Rio de la Plata, looking
for silver, only circling back, with
emotions de Orellana must have felt,
floating 2,000 miles down the Amazon.