Taming the Alien

‘One of the most disturbing facts that came out in the Eichman trial was that a psychiatrist examined him and pronounced him perfectly sane. We equate sanity with a sense of justice, with humanness, with the capacity to love and understand people. We rely on the sane people of the world. And now it begins to dawn on us that it is precisely the sane one’s who are the most dangerous.’
— Thomas Merton

Fenton liked Mexico. Well, he liked Acapulco in so far as it was hot and sleazy. And boy was it hot, was it ever?

From early morning that heat just rolled up and smacked you in the face.

A sucker punch.

He was staying at El Acapulco and, wow, how did they come up with that? El?

Lounging by the pool, he signalled a waiter.

‘Si, Senor?’

This was great, like being in a John Wayne movie. Fenton had, like tops, ten Spanish words and decided to spend a few now. Tried: ‘Donde esta la Rio Grande?’

‘Senor?’

‘Just pulling yer chain mate.’ He held up two fingers and said, ‘Dos Don Equis.’

‘Si, Senor.’

Fenton stretched and then read what he’d so far composed.

SILHOUETTES

So Sharp the budding hope — a flicker

lone your face

this night a past remember

can you some the dread took on

this silhouetted

this justified alone …

That’s it. That’s what he had.

Once he’d heard David Bowie interviewed. What the spiderman did was, write all the lines down, then cut them up with a scissors and let ’em scatter on the floor. Then he’d pick them up haphazardly and that’d be the shape.

The beers came, silver tray ’n’ all. The waiter was about to pour when Fenton shouted, ‘Jeez, Jose, don’t do that! Yah friggin wet-back, don’t yah know shit, yah spic bastard?’

Fenton had seen the change from glasses to bottles. No one used a glass no more. Just took that beer by the neck, chugged it cool.

Posing.

Oh sure, but what the fuck — he could nod towards cool. Plus, he really liked the way the moisture drops slid down the bottle, like pity.

He looked at the waiter who was standing perplexed and said, ‘Yo, Jose, get with the game, vamoos caballero,’ and laughed. He was having a high old time. The waiter, whose name was Gomez, went back to the bar and said, ‘That animal needs taming.’

If you’d leant on the precise translation, you’d get the exact sense of ‘gringo’ to suggest ‘Alien’.

Hurricane Pauline was building, moving closer.