Lost in Havana

6
I'm alone in the heart of Havana, the streets deserted. The Caribbean sun has long since left it, and the warmth, that hours before bathed this city, leeches slowly away like the tide. But something magical pulses still. Among the normal twilight sounds a city makes I hear a distant modulation in the air, a rhythm that gives tempo to my steps and leads them off. A few moments later I find myself in an alley, and by stoop and stride I face a door. When I open it, the indefinite rhythm of before becomes a panoply of melody and percussion bathed in a voice both sweet and melancholic. There's Omara Portuondo singing as only she can. The place is as empty as the streets outside and the voice seems to come from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. I find myself by a table, a bottle of rum, an empty glass. Before I can take a drink I hear the first chords of "La Sitiera" and in that moment I feel your hand on my shoulder. I look to my side and find your eyes, and an enigmatic smile that says all that there is to be said. We move out to the dance floor, and there, surrounded by tables long ago abandoned, we enter the world that Omara weaves with her voice. I hold your body against mine, and you my gaze within yours, and we dance ever so slowly on these floating notes, on this the verdant ground of our daily communion.
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