ALTOS

I am drawn to these places where the world is still real, where you can feel the past and the connection between things and the course of events that led everything to this point, where you can look back and see the path upon which you came, a way not so easily paved over by denial nor disillusionment.

As I arrive, we study one another out of the corner of the eye, but Mayan kindness is virtuous, and I am welcomed into a home most would consider nothing more than a barn for livestock. Nonetheless, they have endured, finding the will to live with dignity on dirt floors. Although the Maya of Guatemala speaks two dozen languages, we talk only with the eyes, and I notice a pair illuminating from a darkened room. But, I cannot yet see the dreams hidden behind those dark pupils, and as the earthen feet of the young girl swiftly scurry from the shadows, I do not sense the dreams that flee with her into the fog and corn stalk.

After taking a few portraits, I bid the family farewell and stepped out of the dark shack into the glowing mist, my shadow cast lightly upon the ground. I set forth upon the dusty path to set their image free, and I feel the sharpness of the sword’s other edge. I take a moment, turn back, and see golden glistening teeth smiling wide. The reality of whom these people actually are behind tired eyes, which I know, will be viewed by many through a filter of false judgment and pity.

The day has drawn to a close as I continue onward for a world they will never know, one that exists only within their dreams, as the young girl emerges from the stalk with a small boy clinched by the hand. She drags his stumbling feet to the edge of her family’s land, and I continue beyond, knowing she truly wants to be seen and fears never being seen again. In a world of her own, to walk away, for visiting eyes to never see again, is akin to death.

Reaching a bend, I turn back one last time, and there she stands, the boy in hand, and through the fog, I see the vanishing silhouette of a waving arm and a dream as clear as day.