TOM CLARK: Jorge Luis Borges: Two tales of the frontier: El muerto (The dead man) / El puñal (The dagger)

[Rosario, Provincia de Santa Fe]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., July 2015

Jorge Luis Borges: El muerto (The dead man)

Que un hombre del suburbio de Buenos Aires, que un triste compadrito sin más virtud que la infatuación del coraje, se interne en los desiertos ecuestres de la frontera del Brasil y llegue a capitán de contrabandistas, parece de antemano imposible. A quienes lo entienden así, quiero contarles el destino de Benjamin Otálora, de quien acaso no perdura un recuerdo en el barrio de Balvanera y que murió en su ley, de un balazo, en los confines de Río Grande do Sul. Ignoro los detalles de su aventura; cuando me sean revelados, he de rectificar y ampliar estas páginas. Por ahora, este resumen puede ser útil.

Benjamín Otálora cuenta, hacia 1891, diecinueve años. Es un mocetón de frente mezquina, de sinceros ojos claros, de reciedumbre vasca; una puñalada feliz le ha revelado que es un hombre valiente; no lo inquieta la muerte de su contrario, tampoco la inmediata necesidad de huir de la República. El caudillo de la parroquia le da una carta para un tal Azevedo Bandeira, del Uruguay. Otálora se embarca, la travesía es tormentosa y crujiente; al otro día, vaga por las calles de Montevideo, con inconfesada y tal vez ignorada tristeza. No da con Azevedo Bandeira; hacia la medianoche, en un almacén del Paso del Molino, asiste a un altercado entre unos troperos. Un cuchillo relumbra; Otálora no sabe de qué lado está la razón, pero lo atrae el puro sabor del peligro, como a otros la baraja o la música. Para, en el entrevero, una puñalada baja que un peón le tira a un hombre de galera oscura y de poncho. Éste, después, resulta ser Azevedo Bandeira. (Otálora, al saberlo, rompe la carta, porque prefiere debérselo todo a sí mismo.) Azevedo Bandeira da, aunque fornido, la injustificable impresión de ser contrahecho; en su rostro, siempre demasiado cercano, están el judío, el negro y el indio; en su empaque, el mono y el tigre; la cicatriz que le atraviesa la cara es un adorno más, como el negro bigote cerdoso.

Proyección o error del alcohol, el altercado cesa con la misma rapidez con que se produjo. Otálora bebe con los troperos y luego los acompaña a una farra y luego a un caserón en la Ciudad Vieja, ya con el sol bien alto. En el último patio, que es de tierra, los hombres tienden su recado para dormir. Oscuramente, Otálora compara esa noche con la anterior; ahora ya pisa tierra firme, entre amigos. Lo inquieta algún remordimiento, eso sí, de no extrañar a Buenos Aires. Duerme hasta la oración, cuando lo despierta el paisano que agredió, borracho, a Bandeira. (Otálora recuerda que ese hombre ha compartido con los otros la noche de tumulto y de júbilo y que Bandeira lo sentó a su derecha y lo obligó a seguir bebiendo.) El hombre le dice que el patrón lo manda buscar. En una suerte de escritorio que da al zaguán (Otálora nunca ha visto un zaguán con puertas laterales) está esperándolo Azevedo Bandeira, con una clara y desdeñosa mujer de pelo colorado. Bandeira lo pondera, le ofrece una copa de caña, le repite que le está pareciendo un hombre animoso, le propone ir al Norte con los demás a traer una tropa. Otálora acepta; hacia la madrugada están en camino, rumbo a Tacuarembó.

Empieza entonces para Otálora una vida distinta, una vida de vastos amaneceres y de jornadas que tienen el olor del caballo. Esa vida es nueva para él, y a veces atroz, pero ya está en su sangre, porque lo mismo que los hombres de otras naciones veneran y presienten el mar, así nosotros (también el hombre que entreteje estos símbolos) ansiamos la llanura inagotable que resuena bajo los cascos. Otálora se ha criado en los barrios del carrero y del cuarteador; antes de un año se hace gaucho. Aprende a jinetear, a entropillar la hacienda, a carnear, a manejar el lazo que sujeta y las boleadoras que tumban, a resistir el sueño, las tormentas, las heladas y el sol, a arrear con el silbido y el grito. Sólo una vez, durante ese tiempo de aprendizaje, ve a Azevedo Bandeira, pero lo tiene muy presente, porque ser hombre de Bandeira es ser considerado y temido, y porque, ante cualquier hombrada, los gauchos dicen que Bandeira lo hace mejor. Alguien opina que Bandeira nació del otro lado del Cuareim, en Rio Grande do Sul; eso, que debería rebajarlo, oscuramente lo enriquece de selvas populosas, de ciénagas, de inextricable y casi infinitas distancias. Gradualmente, Otálora entiende que los negocios de Bandeira son múltiples y que el principal es el contrabando. Ser tropero es ser un sirviente; Otálora se propone ascender a contrabandista. Dos de los compañeros, una noche, cruzarán la frontera para volver con unas partidas de caña; Otálora provoca a uno de ellos, lo hiere y toma su lugar. Lo mueve la ambición y también una oscura fidelidad. Que el hombre (piensa) acabe por entender que yo valgo más que todos sus orientales juntos.

Otro año pasa antes que Otálora regrese a Montevideo. Recorren las orillas, la ciudad (que a Otálora le parece muy grande); llegan a casa del patrón; los hombres tienden los recados en el último patio. Pasan los días y Otálora no ha visto a Bandeira. Dicen, con temor, que está enfermo; un moreno suele subir a su dormitorio con la caldera y con el mate. Una tarde, le encomiendan a Otálora esa tarea. Éste se siente vagamente humillado, pero satisfecho también.

El dormitorio es desmantelado y oscuro. Hay un balcón que mira al poniente, hay una larga mesa con un resplandeciente desorden de taleros, de arreadores, de cintos, de armas de fuego y de armas blancas, hay un remoto espejo que tiene la luna empañada. Bandeira yace boca arriba; sueña y se queja; una vehemencia de sol último lo define. El vasto lecho blanco parece disminuirlo y oscurecerlo; Otálora nota las canas, la fatiga, la flojedad, las grietas de los años. Lo subleva que los esté mandando ese viejo. Piensa que un golpe bastaría para dar cuenta de él. En eso, ve en el espejo que alguien ha entrado. Es la mujer de pelo rojo; está a medio vestir y descalza y lo observa con fría curiosidad. Bandeira se incorpora; mientras habla de cosas de la campaña y despacha mate tras mate, sus dedos juegan con las trenzas de la mujer. Al fin, le da licencia a Otálora para irse.

Días después, les llega la orden de ir al Norte. Arriban a una estancia perdida, que está como en cualquier lugar de la interminable llanura. Ni árboles ni un arroyo la alegran, el primer sol y el último la golpean. Hay corrales de piedra para la hacienda, que es guampuda y menesterosa. El Suspiro se llama ese pobre establecimiento.

Otálora oye en rueda de peones que Bandeira no tardará en llegar de Montevideo. Pregunta por qué; alguien aclara que hay un forastero agauchado que está queriendo mandar demasiado. Otálora comprende que es una broma, pero le halaga que esa broma ya sea posible. Averigua, después, que Bandeira se ha enemistado con uno de los jefes políticos y que éste le ha retirado su apoyo. Le gusta esa noticia.

Llegan cajones de armas largas; llegan una jarra y una palangana de plata para el aposento de la mujer; llegan cortinas de intrincado damasco; llega de las cuchillas, una mañana, un jinete sombrío, de barba cerrada y de poncho. Se llama Ulpiano Suárez y es el capanga o guardaespaldas de Azevedo Bandeira. Habla muy poco y de una manera abrasilerada. Otálora no sabe si atribuir su reserva a hostilidad, a desdén o a mera barbarie. Sabe, eso si, que para el plan que está maquinando tiene que ganar su amistad.

Entra después en el destino de Benjamin Otálora un colorado cabos negros que trae del sur Azevedo Bandeira y que luce apero chapeado y carona con bordes de piel de tigre. Ese caballo liberal es un símbolo de la autoridad del patrón y por eso lo codicia el muchacho, que llega también a desear, con deseo rencoroso, a la mujer de pelo resplandeciente. La mujer, el apero y el colorado son atributos o adjetivos de un hombre que él aspira a destruir.

Entra después en el destino de Benjamin Otálora un colorado cabos negros que trae del sur Azevedo Bandeira y que luce apero chapeado y carona con bordes de piel de tigre. Ese caballo liberal es un símbolo de la autoridad del patrón y por eso lo codicia el muchacho, que llega también a desear, con deseo rencoroso, a la mujer de pelo resplandeciente. La mujer, el apero y el colorado son atributos o adjetivos de un hombre que él aspira a destruir.

Aquí la historia se complica y se ahonda. Azevedo Bandeira es diestro en el arte de la intimidación progresiva, en la satánica maniobra de humillar al interlocutor gradualmente, combinando veras y burlas; Otálora resuelve aplicar ese método ambiguo a la dura tarea que se propone. Resuelve suplantar, lentamente, a Azevedo Bandeira. Logra, en jornadas de peligro común, la amistad de Suárez. Le confía su plan; Suárez le promete su ayuda. Muchas cosas van aconteciendo después, de las que sé unas pocas. Otálora no obedece a Bandeira; da en olvidar, en corregir, en invertir sus órdenes. El universo parece conspirar con él y apresura los hechos. Un mediodía, ocurre en campos de Tacuarembó un tiroteo con gente riograndense; Otálora usurpa el lugar de Bandeira y manda a los orientales. Le atraviesa el hombro una bala, pero esa tarde Otálora regresa al Suspiro en el colorado del jete y esa tarde unas gotas de su sangre manchan la piel de tigre y esa noche duerme con la mujer de pelo reluciente. Otras versiones cambian el orden de estos hechos y niegan que hayan ocurrido en un solo día.

Bandeira, sin embargo, siempre es nominalmente el jefe. Da órdenes que no se ejecutan; Benjamín Otálora no lo toca, por una mezcla de rutina y de lástima.

La última escena de la historia corresponde a la agitación de la última noche de 1894. Esa noche, los hombres del Suspiro comen cordero recién carneado y beben un alcohol pendenciero. Alguien infinitamente rasguea una trabajosa milonga. En la cabecera de la mesa, Otálora, borracho, erige exultación sobre exultación, júbilo sobre júbilo; esa torre de vértigo es un símbolo de su irresistible destino. Bandeira, taciturno entre los que gritan, deja que fluya clamorosa la noche. Cuando las doce campanadas resuenan, se levanta como quien recuerda una obligación. Se levanta y golpea con suavidad a la puerta de la mujer. Ésta le abre en seguida, como si esperara el llamado. Sale a medio vestir y descalza. Con una voz que se afemina y se arrastra, el jefe le ordena:

—Ya que vos y el porteño se quieren tanto, ahora mismo le vas a dar un beso a vista de todos.

Agrega una circunstancia brutal. La mujer quiere resistir, pero dos hombres la han tomado del brazo y la echan sobre Otálora. Arrasada en lágrimas, le besa la cara y el pecho. Ulpiano Suárez ha empuñado el revólver. Otálora comprende, antes de morir, que desde el principio lo han traicionado, que ha sido condenado a muerte, que le han permitido el amor, el mando y el triunfo, porque ya lo daban por muerto, porque para Bandeira ya estaba muerto.

Suárez, casi con desdén, hace fuego.

[Sierra de la Ventana, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., December 2016

The dead man

That a man from the suburbs of Buenos Aires, a sad upstart with no virtue save an infatuation with courage, would break through the equestrian deserts of the Brazilian border and reach the head of a group of smugglers initially seemed impossible. To those who see it that way I would like to relate the destiny of a certain Benjamín Otálora, of whom perhaps no memory is lost in Balvanera and who died on his own terms, from a bullet, in the confines of the Rio Grande do Sul. The details of his adventure are not known to me; once they are revealed I will have to correct and expand these pages. For the time being this summary may prove useful.

By 1891 Benjamín Otálora was nineteen years old. He was a big lad with a small forehead, light-colored, sincere eyes, and typically Basque brawn; a felicitous knife fight revealed that he was a brave man; the death of his opponent did not bother him, nor did his immediate need to flee the Republic. The leader of the parish gave him a letter for a certain Azevedo Bandeira, of Uruguay. Otálora set out, the crossing torturous and oppressive; the next day he was wandering through the streets of Montevideo in unconfessed and perhaps unexplained sadness. He did not find Azevedo Bandeira; towards midnight in a warehouse in Paso del Molino, he was present for an altercation among some cattle ranchers. A blade flashed; Otálora was not sure who was in the right, but he was attracted by the pure scent of danger like others were drawn to cards or music. During the brawl, one of the laborers stabbed a man in a poncho and dark hat below the belt; this turned out to be Azevedo Bandeira (upon learning this, Otálora ripped up the letter, preferring to keep it all to himself). However robust he may have been, Azevedo Bandeira gave the unjustifiable impression of being deformed. In his face, always a bit round, were the faces of the Jew, the African, and the Indian; in his demeanor, that of the monkey and the tiger; the scar across his face was one more adornment, just like his swinish black whiskers.

Projection or illusion of drink, the altercation ended as quickly as it had begun. Otálora tippled with the ranchers and walked them first to a party and then a large house in the Old City, the sun now quite high. In the last courtyard, which was of earth, all the men set up their things to go to sleep. Darkly, Otálora compared this night to the previous night. Now he was already walking on solid ground with friends. If he had any regrets it was that he didn't miss Buenos Aires. He slept until prayers, when he was woken up by the rancher who attacked Bandeira drunk (Otálora remembered that this man had shared in the night of tumult and jubilation and that Bandeira had sat him to his right and obliged him to keep drinking). The man said that he had been sent by the boss to look for him. At a sort of desk which led out to the hallway (Otálora had never seen a hallway with side doors) Azevedo Bandeira was waiting for him, with a thin and disdainful woman with reddish hair. Bandeira sized him up, offered him a dish of sugar cane, repeated that he seemed to him to be an enthusiastic fellow, and then proposed going north with the rest of the troops. Otálora accepted; until the early morning they were on the road heading for Tacuarembó.

It was here that a different life began for Otálora, a life of wide, almost endless dawns and workdays that had the smell of horses. This was a new life for him, and at times atrocious, but it was in his blood. For as men of other nations venerate and have presentiments about the sea, so do we (as well as the man who weaves these symbols) yearn for the endless prairie that resonates below our hooves. Otálora had grown up in the neighborhoods of drivers and landlords; a year ago he became a gaucho. He learned how to ride, get the horses accustomed to living in herds, slaughter cows, master the lasso and the ranchers who lasso, resist sleep, storms, ice, and the sun, urge on the cattle with whistles and shouts. Only one time during this whole period of apprenticeship did he see Azevedo Bandeira, but he was always present, because to be a man of Bandeira was to be respected and feared. And because, before any man, the gauchos said that Bandeira would make him better. Someone thought that Bandeira was born on the other side of the Cuareim, in the Rio Grande do Sul. This, which should have lowered him, obscurely enriched him with populous forests, with swamps, with inextricable and almost infinite distances. Gradually Otálora came to see that Bandeira had many different businesses and that the lifeblood of his operations was smuggling. To be a rancher was to be a servant; Otálora suggested that he be made a smuggler. Two members of the company were going to cross the frontier one night and return with some batches of sugar cane; Otálora provoked one of them, injured him and took his place. He was moved by ambition and also by some dark loyalty. May the man (he thought) come to understand that I am worth more than all his easterners put together.

A year passed before Otálora returned to Montevideo. They passed along the shores then the city (which seemed to Otálora to be very large), and arrived at the boss's house. The men had their equipment in the last courtyard. Days passed and Otálora did not see Bandeira. They said, fearfully, that he was sick. A dark-skinned man would go up to his bedroom with a boiler and with mate. One evening, this task was entrusted to Otálora. He felt vaguely humiliated but satisfied at the same time.

The bedroom was stripped bare and dark. There was a balcony with a view of the west wind, a large table with a dazzling mountain of Talers, bullwhips, belts, firearms, and knives, and a distant mirror fogged up by moonlight. Bandeira was lying there face up, dreaming and complaining, and the sun's persistence ultimately betrayed his contours. As Otálora noticed the grey hair, the fatigue, the cracks of age, the vast white bed seemed to diminish and obscure him. It infuriated him that this old man was their leader; he began to think that one good smash would do him in. Still immersed in thought, he saw by the mirror that someone had entered the room: it was, he observed, the red-haired woman. She was half-dressed and barefoot and was looking at him with aloof interest. Bandeira sat up. While he was prattling on about the campaign and downing mate after mate, his fingers played with the woman's braids. Finally, he allowed Otálora to leave.

Days later came the order to head north. They arrived at an abandoned outpost which was like any other place on the endless prairie. No trees, not even a stream was there to relieve them, and first light and last struck them in equal force. Quarries belonged to the farm which was horned and indigent, the name of this poor establishment being The Sigh.

Otálora heard from among the laborers that Bandeira would not be making it to Montevideo. He asked why; someone explained to him that there was a foreign gaucho who wanted a little too much power. Otálora understood this as a joke, but it flattered him anyway that this joke might indeed be possible. He later ascertained that Bandeira had made an enemy of one of the political chiefs and that the latter had rescinded his support. This news pleased him.

Then long weapons arrived in boxes; they were followed by a tankard and washbowl of silver for the woman's chamber, baskets of woven damask, baskets of knives, morning, and a cheerless horseman with a sharply clipped beard and a poncho. His name was Ulpiano Suárez and he was the capanga or bodyguard of Azevedo Bandeira. He was a man of few words and a very Brazilian manner. Otálora did not know whether to impute his reserve to hostility, disdain, or mere barbarism; what he did know was that according to the plan he was hatching, he would have to gain his friendship.

Then there entered into the destiny of Benjamín Otálora a brownish-red black-tailed horse from the Rio Grande do Sul that Azevedo Bandeira rode, and which shined from its plated tack with tiger skin trim. This unbridled steed was a symbol of the boss's authority, and for that reason the boy coveted it. He also came to desire, perhaps with some resentment, the woman with the dazzling hair. The woman, the tack, and the brownish-red steed were all attributes of the man he sought to destroy.

And here is where the story becomes more complicated and profound. Azevedo Bandeira was skilled in the art of progressive intimidation, in the Satanic maneuver of humiliating his interlocutor gradually, combining truth and jokes. Otálora decided to apply this ambiguous method to the laborious task which he gave himself. He resolved to supplant, slowly, Azevedo Bandeira. He managed, during workdays of common danger, to gain Juárez's friendship. He confided to him his plan and Suárez pledged his support. Many things would happen thereafter of which I only know a few. Otálora did not obey Bandeira; in fact, he tried to forget, correct, and reverse his orders. The universe seemed to be conspiring with him and accelerating the events. One day around noon in the fields of Tacuarembó there was a gunfight with some locals from the Rio Grande do Sul. Otálora usurped the place of Bandeira and took command of the easterners. A bullet hit him in the shoulder, but that afternoon Otálora returned to The Sigh on the chief's brownish-red horse, and that afternoon a few drops of blood stained the tiger skin, and that night he slept with the woman with the refulgent hair. Other versions changed the order of these facts and denied that they all took place in the course of a single day.

Bandeira, however, was still nominally the chief. He gave orders that were not carried out; Benjamín Otálora did not touch him out of a mix of routine and pity.

The story's final scene corresponded to the agitation on the last night of 1894. That night, the men of The Sigh ate some recently slaughtered pork and drank some troublesome liquor; someone strummed a milonga with great effort. At the head of the table and drunk, Otálora raised exultation after exultation, cheer after cheer, and this vertiginous tower was the symbol of his irresistible destiny. Bandeira, taciturn among those shouting, let the night flow along in riot. When the clock struck twelve he got up like someone who remembered an obligation. He got up and knocked softly on the woman's door. She opened immediately as if expecting his visit. She walked out half-dressed and barefoot. With a voice both feminine and groveling, the chief commanded her:

"If you and the fellow from Buenos Aires love each other so much, it's about time you gave him a kiss in front of everyone."

And here came a rather brutal twist. The woman wanted no part of this plan, but two men took her by the arm and threw her atop of Otálora. Devastated and in tears, she kissed his face and chest. Ulpiano Suárez had already taken out his revolver. Before dying, Otálora understood that they had betrayed him from the very beginning, that he had been condemned to death, that they had allowed him love, power, and triumph, because they had already taken him for dead, because for Bandeira he was already dead.

Suárez, almost with disdain, opened fire.

Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986): El muerto (The dead man), from El Aleph, 1949 (English version by Hadi Deeb)

[Ciudad Vieja, Montevideo]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., November 2015

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., April 2016

[Pinamar, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2017

Untitled | by . Lautaro Garcia .

[Pinamar, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2017

[Pinamar, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2017

[Montevideo]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., March 2015

[Ciudad Vieja, Montevideo]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., November 2015

[Minas, Lavalleja, Uruguay]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., March 2015

[Rio de La Plata, Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2016

Nocturnes / Mood Indigo (no more turquoise days)

Gunmetal grey waves crashing under funnel clouds
against Montevideo shore

deep blue sinking into green by

the mouth of the Plata sopping sedge meadows slowly

the mood drifts and changes. The night grows brief
ultramarine

premonitions shift into light patches somewhere beneath space

awareness. the life of the mind a distant luxury
any more
like the light of stars

[Atlantic Ocean, Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2016

[Atlantic Ocean, Uruguay]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2016

[Argentina]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2016

[Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., 3 January 2016

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., 3 March 2016

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., March 2016

Untitled | by . Lautaro Garcia .

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., March 2016

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., April 2016

[San Juan Cordillera]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., October 2016

[Sierra de la Ventana, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., December 2016

[Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., May 2016

[Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., July 2016

[Argentina]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., July 2016

[Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., July 2016

[Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., August 2016

[Esteros del Iberá, Provincia de Corrientes]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., August 2016

[Rio Parañá, Provincia de Corrientes]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., August 2016

[Pinamar, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2017

Jorge Luis Borges: El puñal (The dagger)

A Margarita Bunge

En un cajón hay un puñal. Fue forjado en Toledo, a fines del siglo pasado; Luis Melián Lafinur se lo dio a mi padre, que lo trajo del Uruguay; Evaristo Carriego lo tuvo alguna vez en la mano.

Quienes lo ven tienen que jugar un rato con él; se advierte que hace mucho que lo buscaban; la mano se apresura a apretar la empuñadura que la espera; la hoja obediente y poderosa juega con precisión en la vaina.

Otra cosa quiere el puñal. Es más que una estructura hecha de metales; los hombres lo pensaron y lo formaron para un fin muy preciso; es, de algún modo eterno, el puñal que anoche mató un hombre en Tacuarembó y los puñales que mataron a César. Quiere matar, quiere derramar brusca sangre.

En un cajón del escritorio, entre borradores y cartas, interminablemente sueña el puñal con su sencillo sueño de tigre, y la mano se anima cuando lo rige porque el metal se anima, el metal que presiente en cada contacto al homicida para quien lo crearon los hombres.

A veces me da lástima. Tanta dureza, tanta fe, tan apacible o inocente soberbia, y los años pasan, inútiles.

[Pinamar, Provincia de Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., January 2017

The dagger
To Margarita Bunge

A dagger rests in a drawer.

It was forged in Toledo at the end of the last century. Luis Melián Lafinur gave it to my father, who brought it from Uruguay. Evaristo Carriego once held it in his hand.

Whoever lays eyes on it has to pick up the dagger and toy with it, as if he had always been on the lookout for it. The hand is quick to grip the waiting hilt, and the powerful obeying blade slides in and out of the sheath with a click. This is not what the dagger wants.

It is more than a structure of metal; men conceived it and shaped it with a single end in mind. It is, in some eternal way, the dagger that last night knifed a man in Tacuarembó and the daggers that rained on Caesar. It wants to kill, it wants to shed sudden blood.

In a drawer of my writing table, among draft pages and old letters, the dagger dreams over and over its simple tiger's dream. On wielding it the hand comes alive because the metal comes alive, sensing itself, each time handled, in touch with the killer for whom it was forged.

At times I am sorry for it. Such power and single-mindedness, so impassive or innocent its pride, and the years slip by, unheeding.

Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986): El puñal (The Dagger), from Evaristo Carriego, 1930, English version by Norman Thomas di Giovanni with the assistance of Susan Ashe

[Untitled]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., 30 December 2011

[Untitled]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., 7 August 2012

[Rio Arroya, Buenos Aires]: photo by . Lautaro Garcia ., 23 January 2013

¿Qué compañeros más útiles del hombre, que los árboles que, a la vez que amenizan su mansión, mantienen la fertilidad del suelo que cultiva? Los árboles protegen las vertientes, impiden la pronta evaporación de las aguas y atraen las lluvias y los rocíos. Los árboles depuran la atmósfera de los gases perniciosos, exhalan el oxígeno que nos da la vida, depuran y fecundan el suelo que los nutre, después de colmarnos de sus dones. Los árboles, nos dan alimento, medicina, vestido, casas, muebles, utensilios, embarcaciones, vehículos de toda clase y mil productos necesarios para las artes todas. Los árboles nos refrigeran con su sombra en el verano y mantienen el fuego del hogar en el invierno; nos protegen contra el huracán y contra el rayo; ofrecen abrigo a las aves y forraje a los ganados; proporcionan recreo a nuestros ojos, melodía a nuestros oídos, perfume a nuestro olfato, regalo a nuestro gusto, grata y útil ocupación a nuestros brazos, vitalidad a nuestro cuerpo, y elevación a nuestro espíritu.

Marcos Sastre, El Tempe Argentino