This is written about a character
that I met down in the--
what do they call it?--
Copper Canyon.
Down in the Sierra Madre.
And he was down there, he was--
couldn't tell if he's telling the truth or not
but he said he was down there on some anthropological projects.
"The Scientist".
"He sat on the porch.
He loved his girl for her different colors.
Her body, from the neck down and inward, from the hands.
A rainbow he breathed over.
The words falling sideways from her mouth.
Typical of Orientals.
Down there in the deepest of canyons
where there were no stars.
Even farther than we had been.
Among the blackest of Indians.
By day, eating their mottled corn,
catching the language of their hair.
He was coming up to go back down in his Jeep.
To drive around to the forest piled with hay
in the rainy season.
The pharmacist from Texas bought him
a beer when he wrapped himself in a blanket of skins.
Toward midnight, in the lantern, one yellow eye looking at us
slid over to his ear.
And last saw him after the others had left
for their tour of Guanajuato.
Singing under his breath.
And beating his drum as he jogged
toward the dirty train that threatened to pull away,
called the [INAUDIBLE].
The porters in their white frock coats,
leaning from the windows, waving.