The Andean Wild Boy — Anca Vlasopolos
Twenty-two thousand feet over the sea the air
thins out the eye
sees through to things at dizzying speed
the elders say –a child calls from the fog a child
cries like a lost goat
is heard by maidens
has no use for married flesh
takes shape out of the crater lake the body
of a youth still slender and stubborn in its grace
he turns to her whose womb
is drawn as by the moon to that lost cry of child in fog
his organ enormous
impales her
he doesn’t know where he ends
leaves her torn disemboweled dead the rocks
still like frightened witnesses
sinks again into the waters till the next time—the elders say
but who will stay to hear Chuzulungu’s wail bouncing off the cliffs
like Condor’s shriek
he who takes shape from water in this thin air
has longed forever for a child of substance
he who runs from llamas and pigs as signs of mountains
cut to size by puny beings
he wishes for a body a bride a son of earth
he urcu runa who has wept these lakes
thrown these colossal boulders in his grief
wants to give life not death
keeps calling from the fog calling
like a lost kid