He stretched out across the pavement, next to the shop, his back against the wall, one leg on top of the other, and slept. He was woken by the enormous marimba some merrymakers from Tumaco were playing right beside him, rehearsing for the procession. He reached out and received the carnival bottle and drank without taking a breath—“here’s to music,” he shouted. A burst of applause comforted him. More people were beginning to circulate for White Day; the first volleys of talcum powder were thrown, streamers were spiralling from roof terraces, they coiled up and down like snakes in the air, menacing him; in the window opposite he saw the extraordinary face of a girl looking out: long black hair framing a white oval, eyes like water, he thought. From the way she was peering, hands clutching the curtains, covering herself from the neck down, he concluded she was naked; you have not disguised your nudity yet; are you my love? Someone at his side said: “It’s as plain as the nose on your face,” and he overheard: “I dreamed the cat was barking, can you believe it?” He felt those radiant eyes upon him: restless, bright with carnival passion, excited by the men passing at her feet — I’ve known some really beautiful girls, but a face with eyes like that, only in Pasto at carnival. “Was it you who threw me the love stone?” he shouted into the uproar of the dance, and knew she would never hear him, but she did because her eyes met his for an instant, and she smiled: was it her?
The door of the shop opened, interrupting them: an ancient woman, at least a hundred years old, whisked away the cobwebs around the door frame with her broom, and swayed rhythmically, to and fro, in time to the music spreading out around them — that can’t be my girl, she’s just a slip of a thing. Several green ostriches ran off down the street, “La Guaneña” was playing like there was no tomorrow; it seemed to him an eagle from the high plateau was flying over the rooftops, up into the carnival sky, a golden eagle, he mused — or a sparrowhawk? — a falcon with a white throat, would that he could open his eyes and fly, “Viva Pasto, Surprise City!” he shouted, I cannot see the volcano from here — he said to no-one, and no-one was listening, Galeras cannot see me, the sacred Urcunina. Where does my girl live? Love’s end: to forgive and be forgiven, all alone thinking of your unique naked voice, this way we will save ourselves from ourselves. Who’ll give me a bit of bread? I’ll laugh about this one day. He despised himself lying there, dirty body across the pavement, time stood still or had passed by, the secret poet Rodolfo Puelles just saw falling bones, bones raining down before his eyes, never-ending, a shower of femurs, craniums, shoulder blades, getting soaked in a downpour of his own bones, he felt wet with blood: it was the aguardiente other drunks were sprinkling in his face. “Rise up, Lazarus,” they said; he answered: “Fetch me Jesus.” He believed time was turning thick, unbreatheable, swarms of insect-children buzzed at his side, who would ever think of bringing them out flying? A puma-man said hello, he wondered whether dogs were taking part in the carnival or if they had hidden them or if they ran away frightened by the drums beating out son to all four points of the compass; he sensed revellers somersaulting past his eyes one by one, the clouds of talc, chests ragged with song, but he did not see a single dog, since leaving home he did not recall seeing one dog, he laughed in amazement, everything in the street turned white, whiter, as though snow had fallen, he shouted — Pasto’s snow, the carnival, Viva Pasto dammit — and could not move.
If that old cook were to appear, one of those witches who no longer appear, a wise woman in the ways of food, then a hearty sancocho would be a miracle, he should eat meat, a poor animal, we even eat insects, one of these days we will consume ourselves — we’re already consuming ourselves — you have to enjoy carnival, what am I waiting for? But he did not manage to get to his feet, scrabbling, the window remained without a face at it, without a girl, once more he wanted to get up in search of the carnival, but it was no use: he fell again — like the Achaean hero, he said — and, when he fell, the earth shook: “what makes the hero weep,” he quoted from memory, “what makes him appeal to the forsaking sea, he is the strongest and fleetest of heroes, the one who could have brought the war to an end, son of a goddess, condemned to a fleeting life, more fleet than he himself: he weeps for Briseis, she of the lovely cheeks, who the gods have taken away, the rancorous gods who do as they please in spite of the heroes,” he kept quiet and waited for applause, heard it all around him, acknowledged it with a wave of the hand, “I love time,” he shouted, and decided to wait, let the carnival come and find me, let the floats come here, let Simón Bolívar come like the punishment you deserve, oh horrible Quiroz, oh Platter you dog, but don’t I have a romantic assignation at the church? He looked for the note he had kept in his pocket and recited it to the world, at the top of his voice; then said “that’s what I call a love poem”—while hungrily eating the paper — now that girl will be mine, thanks to my binge, and she’ll give me the love I asked for; she’ll be the love of my life, she’ll teach me her spelling, we’ll make love three hundred and sixty-five times a day to mock death as it should be mocked, but he had to get to their date. How? He could not move — oh, let her come here, like the carnival. Who goes there? I see you, I’m watching you, why don’t you say hello? Oh, old men, the street, walls, roofs coming down on top of him, numerous different-coloured noises, insatiable voices, unpronounceable faces, and yes, he rolled over, I see them going past. Or was he hallucinating? He saw those poets drunk on light pass by; there they went with their sonorous names: Helcías Martán Góngora and Guillermo Payán Archer, didn’t one of them write that the world is a bitter bazaar of empty souls? Where to run to, where? Shivering, he saw the only great poet, Aurelio Arturo, on his own: dark suit, white hat. And a troop of friends followed; at what point did each of them turn to mist and vanish? He felt tremendous despair at himself, lying there, unable to move, a slave — worse than the whole mass of men who once received “a gift of a day” on which to be happy, far worse than all of them, what good did it do to greet the ghosts of poets passing by? Why all these spectres and Carriages of the Afterlife? When would he be capable of writing pure poetry? Or were the enchanted vaginas his poetry? Did he possess poetry, did poetry possess him? I must go, clear-headed, through the carnival for a minute, to see what’s going on, nothing’s going on, the carnival is pure intoxication, cheer up, but it laid him low to recall that he remembered absolutely nothing of the recent early morning, not one detail, a wink of memory’s eye, nothing. What did he do? Kill?
He thought or dreamed he remembered walking through the outskirts of Pasto, lost; the carnival was thumping down below, but he carried on away from Pasto, stubbornly; he wanted to get as far as Tumaco, drinking. He crossed a bridge over a clear river, a spot he did not know, and saw a horse coming along the dusty highway, black head turned to the side, trotting hesitantly, and, behind it, stumbling along, an old woman, with a black hat and shawl, a lasso in her hands: she did not seem to be coming from any carnival, but there were talc marks on her skirt. From time to time she shouted “hey, hey,” and stopped to catch her breath. He was watching her from the other side of the highway: her legs were swollen, she was barefoot, her feet the colour of soil, she must be sick, the skin on her face was ulcerated, peeling, like she was shedding it. She turned to look at him, for a second, and he was shocked to see her nose split down the middle, an old wound that looked like resin, the two eye teeth protruding over her lip greeted him silently, her eyes flashed ferociously, and she carried on running. She’ll never catch it up, he thought, and, as though she had heard him, she turned her horrible face to look at him again. He closed his eyes, from pity, shame, disgust, panic, in order not to see her, but he carried on suffering that divided woman’s face: he thought it was a face that hated, that hated him and that he hated, it was like revenge, he would dream of her, he thought, and he followed her, he followed them, in spite of himself, up to the highest point of the highway, and spotted them not far off, on a piece of flat level ground, she had managed to lasso the horse around its sweaty neck and was tugging on the slip knot, holding it tight. The horse reared up on its hind legs, surprised to be caught, and pawed the air. She approached, bent over, and continued calling out “hey, hey” until her voice became a triumphant whisper, and the horse stopped pawing, bent its black neck, allowed her to come near and almost touch it and then in a flash of hatred reared up and came down on top of the old woman, kicked her in the chest, knocked her to the ground and set off at a gallop, dragging the rope that snaked bloodily along through the dust on the highway, between curls of smoke. He ran to the old woman and leaned over her: the black hat on one side, white with dust, like she was; her hands fat-palmed and open on the ground, slashed by the rope; thick copper-coloured calves, tattooed with violet scars. He thought he should feel sorry for her, but the wound in the middle of her face stopped him: now it looked like a terrifying laugh, poking fun at him. “That horse is diabolical,” he heard her say — what a sibylline voice, what a shiver-inducing voice—“but today I am more so,” she said, “soon you’ll know what I am,” and he saw her get up as if nothing had happened; her skirt fell open; a bitter smell of burnt wood sprang from her body. Then he heard galloping again, coming closer all the time, thundering, he could not see the horse, where it came from, what place, what region it was galloping towards them from, and now the terror was too much, the whinnying sounded like a whirlwind, the galloping carried on getting closer, he heard it thump inside him, throb, heard his own heart thumping against the ground, Puelles had turned face down, on the paving stone, “the old woman will confront the horse,” he said to passers-by, “the horse will kill her,” he shouted, if his grandfather were to come to collect him, grandfather was up to the job, my saviour, he would be looking for him, he remembered his granddad dancing with a broom — more migratory bottles cut across the crowd from hand to hand, they came and went from one side of the city to the other, someone shouted “drink, dammit, the devil’s at the party,” the floating bottle appeared and Puelles drank, gratefully.