The unrestricted sun
had split the day in two,
and now we went
on the edge of the afternoon
like a tableau of bent figures
made of faded blue duck.
We went like a wandering
and stinking, sweating brotherhood,
pull by pull between
the leafy cotton plants,
with the pathetic appearance of arriving
at the end of the furrow.
But we always arrived
in a rush to get there,
and the sole logic was
we had to move over
to the next furrow,
and no one could stop
the counterflow down it.
And I, the dusty kid
left behind in the middle of the field,
held prisoner in my own slow shadow,
was right
in not giving in to the absurd pace
of tradition.
So my days burned up
in that captive state
of childhood.
Then, yes,
it was then the venturesomeness
of sedition overtook me.
Saturdays,
after noon,
the body finally lying down
in the waves of the aluminum bathtub.
And in the liberating rite of the water,
I could shed
the grime and contemplate
the muddy waters of time.
So it was,
with the ablution of the weekly bath,
I exiled myself each time
from what I was.