center

Retired from dictating, Pinochet spent the mid-1990s cruising around Santiago in one of the three cars, a security measure should the convoy be attacked by one of his many enemies.

I look at Bernardo, trying to figure out if he’s seeing the old gringo too, and reassure me that he’s not a figment of my imagination. But my brother is frozen to the ground like an ice statue.

Jesus Christ said to love them
back, but oh, Messiah, it’s hard.
Let the waves of mirth break 
upon your breast; the ground will 
quake—and swallow 

 I'm sure that, after being

 cataclysmically submerged in water,

 any broken mountain

 becomes a memory of an unknown

Done with smoke, done with shatter, the shamed lead the shameful to the shore, with its boats of bones, ships of shadows, blind seers, and dead crews bending to oars.

It was a freezing day.  I mentioned something about the cold, when the uncle suddenly turned angry.  Loudly berating my comment, calling it unnecessary.

My life’s course—my separation from most people, my extinguished hopes, the accumulation of final betrayals—seems almost preordained by the place where I first drew breath...

Graffiti magically appeared on the walls of the federal detention center: "FUCK ICE" and "DEATH TO ICE" and "FUCK DONALD TRUMP" but also farewell messages like "LOVE YOU DADDY."

At the blood-draw, in the dentist's chair

and during similar situations,

I think about my premature daughter,

the first time I saw her,

Nietzsche: In fact, we philosophers and ‘free spirits’ feel ourselves irradiated as by a new dawn by the report that the ‘old God is dead’; our hearts overflow with gratitude, astonishment, presentiment and expectation.