Left Field Occidental by Benjamin Pfau

LEFT FIELD OCCIDENTAL

Contents

The Pleasant Ways They Hurled Themselves from Waterfalls Downtown Cancun Left Field Occidental I Tend to Agree Chichen Itza #1 (Mayan Tic Tac Toe) Guanajuato The Big Flush Runaway Sky

“The children crowded about the women in the houses. What we going to do, Ma? Where we going to go? The women said, We don’t know yet, Go out and play!” - John Steinbeck (The Grapes of Wrath)

The Pleasant Ways You, Me and maybe a bunch of other people We should smoke some jays and daze our days in aerosols of purple haze A day trip to the pleasant ways Swathing drowsiness, here it comes your fingers and your toes go numb. Better flip the candy and fry your brain weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll keep on sucking on that sugar cane. Our thoughts will liquefy torrents that bend the fabrics of reality will drag us to the bottom of the sea where the glow of a lanternfish will guide us to a long-lost bay an improbable arcane hide-away. Wrapped up in the cosmic cocoon the sun will greet us in iridescent light and while we sway in peace weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll wake up from our psychonautic sleep.

They Hurled Themselves from Waterfalls In the land of many trees where rivulets run freely between the hills they hurl themselves from waterfalls. Concealed In the darkness of the night human cannonballs plunge into cerulean pools of water shaking up Tepeu and Gucamatz who are busy inventing word after word for a world that is shaping up for the apocalypse. They are young and they don’t mind they are free and they don’t care some might say they are oracular spectacular tetris blocks from the cat’s eye nebula. Tabula Rasa! Another splash, another bomb, this time accompanied by a larger-than-life synth orchestra, the reverberated echoes of the last bird in paradise greet our guests. As they glide through the eerie shimmering water of those tidal pools Gucamatz the eternal serpent in his Quetzal feather gown slithers over the young naked bodies of our guests and leaves his mark on their unblemished skin.

At the break of dawn light enters the nile green glade and the juvenescent nudes dance in a circle. Pure and serene like they were rendered by Matisse they carry a youthful sense of wonder into another day.

Downtown Cancun I spent one night in Downtown Cancun and met this American girl dressed in a pink shirt, pink shorts and pink kicks at a taco stall at Plaza de las Palapas. She started telling me her story how she was stuck in Cancun this most awful place where white beaches just donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seem that white, why are they not white itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the people she told me. We met just before Christmas I did not understand. What was she doing there? Go home, girl, I thought. There must be someone. But I did not say anything. I paid for tacos, then we went back to my place. 8

The place was a dump there was not a lot of light it was bare, in the corner there was a smudgy white plastic table and two coca cola chairs, the bed was covered with thin yellow sheets with little brown blots on the white tiles more blots they were black. She laid down on the bed somehow eerily her limbs were stiff her clothes were this starchy pink all of her so rigid she was the living manifestation of one of those blow-up sex dolls. I told her that Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll get a couple of beers when I came back we had some then it was better. We stopped before we really started though. I played with her cooch I never touched a cooch like that before.

Slipping off her clit I wanted to press my fingers into her, but there was a little hole I got stuck in before I got into the real thing. I paused. Our eyes met. She took a deep breath. I remember how quiet it was, there was only the rattling of the fan. Maybe a mosquito. You could feel the room expanding. Her face looked pale, her cheekbones stood out, her skin was rough. That moment I noticed her smell. It was musky, strong, familiar sweat I did not like it. She knew it was time to explain. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s been four years, I didâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know if I should have told you before, she said. 10

I always wanted to change. She went to Thailand it took a while to set things up but then she got her first operation she started taking estrogen and did yoga several times a week. Before her second operation she went to a vipassana retreat in the mountains. The flight back felt so good. I had no idea, she said. Our eyes met again, herâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s were tawny. Will you still kiss me? she asked. I did. The sex was very robotic, but I like to think we both really tried. Afterwards she resumed where we left off. She had so much to say. I lighted a cigarette and looked out of the window. 11

We were in the basement, outside it was just getting dark, the night had not even started. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m fucked, a dramatic pause, And in more than one way, she said. She was conscious about her voice she knew she was overacting she probably had the right to overact itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just funny that in real life it never seems befitting. I tell you, I never wanted to be here in the first place, she said. When you have to run away, you run, I just ran all the way my money lasted, she said. I nodded. I was running myself. Originally she grew up in the South, she told me. Somewhere around Myrtle Beach. Her parents were Southern Baptists. 12

It was hard being a teenager she said. I always knew I was not a boy but when everyone else thought you were what can you really do? I put on my sister’s clothes before, but then one day, I just walked like that to school. She was quiet. She got a pack of menthols out. She looked out of the window and lighted one. See, the crazy thing was, the moment I got out and started living my life, everything turned out a million times worse than expected, she continued. School was a mess, I couldn’t finish. Then I went to Charlotte, then to New York, but that didn’t work out, either. Don’t get me wrong, I still love New York, but I was just too poor.

I started working the streets I got good money that way, that’s when I did the sex change, but I wanted to leave that life behind, you don’t want to think of yourself as a hooker, you know? she said. I tried to work things out with my parents, but that did not happen. I got into a fight with my father, I was sprinting out of the house, and he fired a gun at me while I was trying to get into the car. I stormed off, went right to Baltimore. Then Washington, Chicago, Minnesota, then she south, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Austin. I was running out of money and couldn’t find any serious work that is I could not hold a position for long people always seemed to figure out someway. I got paranoid, thought my parents had something to do with it to tell the truth I still think it’s them but I don’t want to sound insane. Then one day, they stole my car. I was stuck, I decided to leave the States. 14

Hola, Mexico. I bussed it down to Guadalajara, then I was in Guanajuato, Mexico City, Puebla, Oaxaca, before I went up to Campeche, then quickly to Merida, I spent some time on Holbox and now I’m here. Same story everywhere, couldn’t get a hold. When she said “hold”, her southern drawl had a sad, profound gravity. She lighted another cigarette. It was just like they say, wherever you go, there you are, she said. There are just some places you can’t run away from. And now she was here. Cancun Quintana Roo Mexico. Same shit.

We had a few more beers that night and a few more tacos. She stayed the night with me, but we did not have sex again. The morning I checked out early, the plane was leaving in three hours. I was glad I had somewhere else to go.

Left Field Occidental Wavy hills an offhand detour into far too futile territories we drop the best from the crest into rock bottom drowning valleys blazing blow deliria high voltage alternate spells leaks of neon spill on my fragile mind. What is it that jolts a body into the unknown shattering mud-spit-blood-covered windshields? Don’t say energy I don’t see no energy. Could you rather tell me who can blank it all out? I want to crouch and unravel have to let it sink in the eye level kneeling the eye level feeling the blacktop still warm bright lights flashing a truck passes vibrating a numbness about to settle for eternity. Dog-tired, with weary eyes I look at the magnetic ground wallowing in my accumulated inertia don’t you think this corpse can still walk and chase his own utopia

one who circles around the imprints of the bygone sun a mad satyr hunter drifting in and out of left field occidental silverspheres you know those volatile topographies too touch and go tell me, where else am I supposed to go?

I Tend to Agree You say that it seems like they really hit it off but so did we at least from the way I remember it to be the time when it was different than all the times before different in a way that I could not ignore sex was satori and satori was peace and piece by piece we found a place that we thought we would never face you showed me the buddhaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s butt unveiled layer for layer as you danced salomeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s dance till I could finally see everything dissolve in endless trance

We were there in that fleeting realm and even though we were overwhelmed I thought that we could make it stay if we worked on it day by day but day by day was not meant to be and after all these years I tend to agree

Chichen Itza #1 (Mayan Tic Tac Toe) Chichen Itza #1 (Mayan Tic Tac Toe) Today I played some Mayan Tic Tac Toe the bas-relief just read XOXO and even when I faced the holy Chichen Itza there was nothing I had rather done than eat you out, my beloved pussy pizza.

Guanajuato In the morning leaving the red little house we go past the tienda de abarrotes past the pungent smell of the blood-filled cleaning buckets from the carniceria next door down on Camino Real I close my eyes to listen to the clacking sounds of your heels ricocheting down the alleyway down Puquero past Adrianâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s blue enclave where a plastic cat is getting manhandled by a beefy doll that walked out of the suggestive world of a Tom of Finland illustration anyway the clickety clackety can be heard past the university even on Plaza de la Paz and probably in front of Teatro JuĂĄrez no I say even behind at the little restaurante that looked a bit chainy but where we had some truly exceptional ceviche a couple of times.

Another day my ears would wait for the tomboyish shuffle of your sneakers the two of us sashaying down the very same colorful alley that would turn into the wrong side of town at night so we always took the cab through those endless meandering tunnels to go back. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m not sure how dangerous it really was I suppose you were just too lazy to make the steep climb. Then that day we took your old Volkswagen bus to your house on the outskirts pushing down the hill to get the engine going a car does not need batteries. Halfway we had to stop at the mechanicâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s no chance the bus was not going we got a crate of beer jumped in the back and it was a friend of the mechanic who pulled the thing all the way way out of town to the house you were building on top of a hill. The sun dissolved in the red horizon closing over the pulsating lights of countless lives, while behind us there was only the blue desert, dust, rocks, cactae all swallowed up by the voracious dark. 23

There was peace the family next door was meant to be there forever you looked good I enjoyed my Tecate it was everything I came for. The next day I got sick, mad crazy sick. I thought this was not going to end well. But you were there we were playing Mario Kart you brought soup from the Asian place down in town and I was sweating myself back to health. A couple days later, you made me walk down the alley again me weak from coughing, still a little delirious, we somehow reached, Plaza de San Fernando, to play chess, the two of us always playing at the plaza, at the bar, at the ceviche place, and at night in bed, jaque mate si, no mames, how could I forget. 24

The Big Flush This is about the roller coasters that you left behind and the future ones that you’ll only pass by It’s about all the leg-kicking, all the ass-whipping, it’s about the nail-biting, heart-wrenching flap-flap the flip-flop, tip-top moments that will only go away now the the and

forget the rumble in the jungle daily grind, the strife, the struggle things that could be, but don’t come by glug a slug from the jug of life

This is the time of the big flush The time you tapped the button and the gush touched the tip of your dick yeah, the back of your balls It’s the whirlpool that will break down all your walls It’s the cascade that will drag you away from the stuff that you couldn’t make stay anyway These are the waves you know from Hiroshige and Hokusai It’s the giant surge that finally had to come by and you you are ready to surf ready to roll ready to ride ready to enjoy another fight. 25

This time you will wake up and the boat will be ready to sail and you don’t look back cause you know it’s not the wake that drives the boat it’s the captain who decides where it will go.

Runaway Sky I wish Ken Kesey was here all of Mexico behind us we ride over muddy tire trails as we are tripping to the far end of the Yucatan Peninsula imprinting the shades of the present on our amygdalas. And those clouds! They are fleeting so fast! I want to follow them and jump on those white pillows so we can sail along on the edge of that gliding dome floating beneath a canopy that transitions seamlessly through a million tones of blue. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s like those patches of cotton cover the surface of an endlessly spinning marble while we are stuck in the standstill core. And while we look ahead past pine trees mysteriously drooping over the gravel road posing for Vinny Van Gogh in the Caribbean Sun we find this sharp line at the end of sight that keeps us away from the runaway sky. My thoughts circle in a very small radius only the smell of the seaweed, the warmth of the sun and the fresh breeze from the waterfront occupy my mind and I know Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll keep on riding till I cross that line.