The Arrival of the Heavenly Corps

They come to our Island on a mission, having heard some
variation of a professor’s You must go see for yourselves how people
in the rest of the world live, spoken in the vatic tone of one who may
have accompanied MLK Jr. on a freedom walk, or helped levitate
the Pentagon in protest of an immoral war. The young women
travel south from their First World in protective packs, making
their way cautiously toward the front lines, outfitted in durable
adventure clothing, the latest lightweight survival gear, and
carrying adequate supplies of sealed and certified bottles of
American water. They are tender young things, Coppertone
babies, who lug around, in the fierce tropical heat, a social
conscience bigger and heavier than their backpacks. And the
arrival of the radiant reformers is watched with great interest by
the women of our pueblo, who take turns at their windows and
balconies. Later, they will gather together in the plaza, to fan
themselves on shady benches, and study more closely the lovely
rubias, who have come to save them from dire poverty, the risks of
standing water, and invisible parasites. Later, over their
midafternoon cafés, las señoras will discuss the possible bleaching
and straightening alchemy that may transform their black-as-the-
bottom-of-a-cauldron, their persistent question-mark-curly
mestiza hair, into the yellow silk crowning the heads of their own
government-approved host of angels.

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