A Drive to the Coast: Part 6

Part 6: Descent and Ascent

by Armando Ortiz

The sun descends into purgatory and wild shape shifters appear from hidden parts of the land.

Grave robbers come out, and pirates land to pillage in places where faceless people rest in peace.

St. Anthony emerges from his cave unharmed playfully pretending that captivity is a sacred past time from a self-imposed exile in a tiny Buddhist tomb.

Separate worlds running parallel to each other meet on the axis of all gravitational centers where dawn remains infinitely on pause and the sacred mornings of death are trampled by greed, hunger, and desperation.

Black panthers devour pythons and anacondas swallow the pale moon whole while caiman lie ready to devour the wandering soul.

Men snatch the precious coral, layered onyx, fine embroidery and speckled gold pins of yesterday exchanging it for paper gold.

Prometheus arrives carrying the sacred fire, and starts setting piles and piles of plywood over mounds of paper preparing for the sacred ceremony under the sky.

We circle and dance, panting, and singing praises to past ancestors using old Zippo lighters to illuminate our way and in unison attempt to ignite the fire.

The torch handed down to us is sent soaring into an arch, and starts the pyre.

Gentle waters reflect the trajectory of the speck of light that ignites a day within the night. 

Whispers from the morning air pass through our bodies.

In this sacred conch of wind and water are waves of yonder that mix and get lost in our parade of wonder.

Miniature protons ignite the needed flame to keep this performance going all night.

An artificial day in darkness is born, and our hearts illuminate our steps, bringing up postulations for contact and lightness of touch.

Ecstasies of cosmic paragons start to happen and sacred creatures that paraglide next to soaring peregrines experience interstellar parallax.

Shadows are cast aside and reveal the door to our hearts.

The earth palpitating thermal waves turn cold, the grains touched with every ponderous step as we dance to the beat in a splendorous trance.

The moon casts her dress on the ocean water. Now her body is naked, and shimmers on the dark waves like the paleness of her white dress.

The dark silhouette of the mountains hold up the cobalt glass above us and the obsidian waters reflect the shivers of the midnight stars.