Siempre Que

“Siempre que estemos vivos nos veremos” “As long as we are alive we will see each other” was the last sentence Yair said to me. We were on the azotea (roof) of block 11, the mist enveloped Caracas, the mad rumour of the city sounded like a funeral song. It was a bullet in my heart. There was something terrible and sublime about the awareness of one’s own end. Everything was said. The urgency of life, the fascination with death, the collapse of the country. The extreme violence and absurdity of the situation gave the impression that life was just a game. I remembered two days earlier the gallina (cockfighting arena). The smell of blood mixed with rum and sweat, the screams of rage, the excitement of every man. An impalpable trance intoxicated the arena. As if we were all crazy. As if blood, death and power made us more alive. The chaotic energy of the city echoed in every fight like a dance that unfolds, stays and weeps helplessly. A month later, Yair was shot. He was 27 years old. My wanderings in Latin America were crossed by other striking encounters. Like those fighting cocks, I saw beings dancing and clinging to the disorder. Each time I found the same insolent sensuality, like a furious provocation, like the cry of an adolescent amused by danger, condemned and free.