Linda Laino Traducción: Jorge Javier Romero The Sailor

THE SAILOR

I am eating pistachios by the sea. The sea that is alive; the sea that is breathing. So says Cheko, my new friend in this coastal hideaway. He lives in a treehouse overlooking the water.

We take in the view as we smoke and pontificate about the beauty and mystery of it all. Later, I see him jogging up and down the beach, his stout Oaxacan frame and wide feet, his grey ponytail keeping the beat. He sees me and flashes his gold tooth, shiny in the distance.

He speaks of the sea like a brother. One he spooned in a liquid womb somewhere in time, a half-breed human born of fluid elements. Like a sailor without a boat, he travels with a sea-mind and a sea-heart and grows fins at night to reunite with his tidal twin.

I am here as a prodigal, returning for ablutions from the water. I dive laden with sins and emerge weightless, holy with its turquoise mantle. Listening to Cheko’s Spanish with its cadence of sea-faring romance, I believe the magic he is telling me; as if the sea sighs are answers to the questions I am afraid to ask.

As night waves roar, he sleeps in syncopation with the rise and fall of his brother’s breath below. A wanderer in search of loving arms, I suck the salty marrow like a balm.

—Linda Laino