On the plain of Nazca I stood and
waited for alien transport.
I lit a cigarette
and stared thinking
somewhere
some time
they've got to come.
I burrowed into the
sheepskin coat I had purchased
outside Cuzco
and stared at my companions.
El Ficuna was an eighty year old black man
with a habit of saying' whatever floats your boat'.
his daughter, Maria Conchesa Ribaldo smoked a pipe
and swore continually
"fuck you you old fart"
There were several others; a teacher from Lancaster Pennsylvania, a retired auto worker from Michigan, a Baptist pastor from Kennebunkport.
We had been promised salvation from this planet by an alien ship that would whisk us to another planet. The person who made this promise had collected our money in the hotel lobby and shown us blurry pictures of what he said were irrefutable proof of
the alien landings.
The guidebook said he was a notorious fake but was worth the money to go to the plains. I knew I shouldn't have dropped acid but I did anyway.
I kept thinking about the lime in coconut song. Something about el Ficuna made think of that commercial on TV years ago and the voodoo quality of the actors voice.
"Hey this is fucking bullshit."
Maria Conchesa was staring at me.
Her face was twisting slightly and had the slight cartoon quality that a good hit of acid can impart on those near you.
"What's wrong with you, you haven't said a word in like an hour?"
"You put the lime in the coconut and stir it all AROUND." I sang my response and then started giggling uncontrollably. I laughed so hard I had to lay down.
"Damn white boy is out of his gourd, maybe them aliens are around here." She took a drag off her pipe.
She had nice legs and from my vantage point I could look right up her skirt and see
her panties. Not that I cared, my whole body felt like rubber where i could feel anything and I had that odd LSD taste in my mouth. I realized I was still laughing and stopped.
Far off across the plain there were small dark figures waving at us.
"I wonder who those people are.' No one had mentioned them. I had seen them for a while, way off in the distance and hadn't thought anything about it.
The sun was shining very brightly and there was maybe one or two small clouds against the dark blue of the high altitude sky.
"Hey, who are those people over there? " I asked no one in particular.
"What people?" The auto worker from Michigan asked me, sounding concerned. Like he was thinking the banditos were coming with machetes to butcher us out here on the cold plain, steal our money and probably bugger us.
"Over there, right there. See? They keep waving."
The others crowded around.
"Where?"
"I don't see any one."
"Me neither."
"what are you talking about? There's no one over there."
They all wandered off except Maria who lay down and used my back as a pillow.
I was laying on my stomach watching the small figures.
"You don't see them either?" I asked her.
She laughed.
Her head felt good resting on my back. The sun was too bright against the ground.
The small figures were dancing around in the distance, occasionally waving at me.
'Maybe I'm seeing trees or bushes or something, I thought although there weren't any growing on the plain.
"I'm going over there." I told Maria.
"Over where the "People" are? She asked.
"Yeah. Over where the people are."
