(Concrete) Jungle
When I sat down to write about Pañacocha, it was hard to decide where to start, so I wrote a sestina poem -- since the sestina has a pretty strict pattern it gave me some direction (see below for my end words: each letter corresponds to an end word for each of 7 stanzas and they must be repeated in that order).
1. ABCDEF 2. FAEBDC 3. CFDABE 4. ECBFAD 5. DEACFB 6. BDFECA 7. (envoi) ECA or ACE + BDF within three lines
A: jungle
B: millennial
C: company D: fresh E: rise F: oil
(Concrete) Jungle
The canoe taps the riverbank, chipping small chunks of mud into the water. Jungle
birds perched amongst damp green flora hasten their chirps, beckoning towards me, an American millennial
entering Pañacocha, Ecuador, in the company
of an American, a Quiteña, and three Kichwa teammates. A fresh
resolve to share, learn, accomplish mixes with the uncertainty of our work as rising
thoughts—predictions?—settle like water and oil
layering in my mind. Our new neighbor/host/“key informant”—friend?—laments the lack of oil
to power his motor through the river-way of this jungle,
grabbing the now empty six-liter water jug as he rises
from his seat next to the tired grey motor that powered us from the millennial
city to the finca. Six pairs of black rubber boots clamor up the path, a fresh
mud coating splatter painting their smooth surfaces. In the company
of ten staring children we pause at the wooden steps to an open, two-story wooden house. Company-
gifted electricity lines slouch among green tree towers: gifts valued at the price of oil
and government intervention, with plenty of change. I kick my boots off my feet; fresh
sweat accumulating under my armpits threatens to slide down my arm outstretched to saludar; jungle
chickens pull my darting eyes; swarms of coloradillas savor my skin, decorating my exposed ankles with millennial
pink targets, leaving behind each blood red bull’s-eye for their larvae to continue to feast. We rise
at 5:40am—sharp, somehow, without a watch—peeling back mosquito netting to glimpse the rising
sun outlining a petroleum company
boat speeding through the Río Napo, not even slowing to glance at the millennial
city that stands as a relic of its cargo: oil,
that turned sacha-selva-jungle to concrete jungle—
a blocked-out, sidewalk-ed, street-lamp-lit, Pleasantville amidst yucca fields and plantain forests, and added freshly
planted rows of café and cacao to chakra lands: development compensation juxtaposing new infrastructure and fresh
produce, all in the name of economic rise,
gains for the State and comunas of the Amazon jungle…
And here, in this casa de madera with a techo de paja, my company
is a lonely rucu mama, a fiercely caring mama—and chickens por todos lados, their eggs sizzling in a río of oil
in the frying pan perched on a proudly purchased gas stove, an item more útil than the entire millennial
house that this abuelita was awarded through negotiations indecipherable to her—to most, save four—as this millennial
city bulldozed land that tigers once patrolled, trading a harmonious violence among natural species for unequal freshly-
minted-cash compensations and an expertly navigated charade of elaborate city plans. Water, trago, oil:
three liquids that will never fully combine, yet here and now are intrinsically linked. I rise
from the flipped wooden canoe bench, dodge three dangling spoons, and pass the refrigerator the company
donated to each homeowner—the refrigerator that is abuelita’s roommate and dresser, because this is the jungle
and although, yes, there is oil, no hay luz. This is the jungle, that proves its strength as fresh grasses rise,
bursting through the sidewalks in the millennial city. This is the jungle that keeps me company
with its chicha and sweet oritos and people open to a gringa barely qualified to machetear. This is the (concrete) jungle.
