Summary

In the short story, “Jim,” an unidentified narrator in Mexico City reflects on “the saddest North American [he’s] ever come across” (3), Jim. The narrator recalls that when some Mexicans asked Jim what poetry is, he first looked up at the sky and then began throwing up. He was mugged several times while traveling in South America, which surprises the narrator because he knows that Jim was a Vietnam veteran.

Jim was married to a “Chicana” (3) woman with a face that, to the author, betrayed a kind of “suffering, simmering rage” (3). While the narrator preferred blondes, Jim preferred dark women: “history’s secret women, he would say” (4). The narrator remembers a time when he saw Jim on the street in Mexico City, watching a flame-eater perform. While most people on the street watched for a few minutes and moved on, Jim remained watching for...