The Amazon River Dolphin

The sudden pink shape surfacing in black-water lagoons shocked explorers. All dolphins share man’s thumb and fingerbones, but these also wear his flesh. When the river overflows and floods the varzea, these dolphins travel miles to splash in the shallows amongst buttress-roots of giant rainforest trees. The waters abate, trapping fish, dolphins never. A lamp burning dolphin oil blinds. At night the pink-flesh contours melt and blur. The flipper extends the hidden hand to lift its woman’s torso to the land. An Eve, born each night from the black Amazon, roams the dark banks for victims to draw to the water and death. Taboo to the Indians, this pink daughter of the river’s magic always looks, to explorers, like she’s smiling.