with apprehension the father
looked at her daughter's face
beyond the backlit glass
I am lonely on this road
& it is not a joyful sunday
it is not the peace of the lord
he says to her through the glass
& she will ignore him because of this inertia
& forget him & make of him an icon
he was bent on the ashtray
& he unloaded the wet & curled ash
of the cigarette & that tasted of tequila
nothing new
squeezing lemons in his mouth
pouring whiskey, before it was [...]
sao paulo do brazil
east chicago
downtown detroit
he was talking to himself & he was repeating
that they recommended, with frequency on television
& of this he was absolutely sure
that after several hours
the important was only:
keep your hands on the wheel
at 5.00 a.m. behind a glass
that once went up in flames
while she was counting
she was telling herself, while calculating,
that she just needed
another stroll around
a sign, huge for those times
the square of tar was bleached
by the low light of the neon
& not of that the stuff on the radio
jazz, that reminded her
so obstinately her mother
& their part-time factotum
who washed the cars of those who passed
or of those got one (the soft parade)
the following year
his brother
published four books
but he failed
to become a writer
under indefinite time contract
he became a bloody nose
on the acropolis of a shopping center
with disinfectant into nostrils
she saw his brother
only as a debt
cost without end
he was a number
that she could not put in a column
exact words
a decapitated budget item
without beginning or an end
an unrelated sign to the accounting
but he remained
one of the attractions of the place
he was the man who was washing cars
he was the man who knew
about engines, transmission, steering, tires
he was their part-time worker
it came naturally
tell the patrons
it's very nice to know you're here
we are at your complete service
although this would involve allusions
in the state of intuition of the people who are here
it would have led to inevitable consequences, they
in their beds where they were hardly fucking
in the showers where they rinsed, touching, all the way down
she took care
also
of personnel management
people who came
from disparate parts of the world
crossing the border illegally
& this excited her
almost as much as
his brother
when his brother
got chicks
she went into adjoining rooms
she heard & while drinking
she made to herself not bad services
lasting some hours
she felt that wilderness
his father was a fuck
a fucking dying paralytic
but he was still a good man
& she was always close to him
after the mother had gone
he did not,
his brother followed her mother
up in the city, in various cities
until she died of cancer
age 45
& he began to roam
then when
for various reasons
he seriously risked life & limb
he showed up
in front of her sister
50 pounds lighter
she bent down & put his head
pressing between the stomach & pubis of him
& she began to smell & she told him
we will do anything you want
you only have to wash cars
occasionally .
