Animalario III

A bird man

A bird man arrived flying through my window. The cold outside steamed the windowpane and I could only distinguish a white, naked shadow, which at first I mistook for a large bat seeking refuge.

He came inside shivering and crashed on my bed. Red-eyed and confused, he looked a bit unsure as to what to do or say in this kind of situation. “At this time of night everything can happen, including ghosts”, I said to myself. And since I had been spending the last couple of days pretty much on my own, with no one to talk to or even to bump against –lost among cigarettes, computers and books-, the first thing I did was to cover his penis and wings with a blanket, holding him tenderly, and then I put the kettle on. Bird men get to me, after all.

“Have I come far?” He asked. He had been wandering lost under the fog, and my light on was the first one he could find. Clearly in shock, he kept smiling at me as if he knew me from somewhere, despite my disheveled appearance and sleepy face. He wouldn’t say anything else, and I will not know to this day whether he came from far away or not. For that I will always hate this impious city, the bitch that insists on keeping us all apart.  

I put on some drum music, and despite of that he kept on shivering. His feet were cold, his wings kind of shrunk and his skin had goose bumps. So, letting out a sigh of resignation, I got naked, already knowing that a woman’s body can warm up a bird man.

The gray, cold dawn had already arrived when he appeared to finally come into his senses. With a scream he spread his wings –milky and red, a bit dirty on the edges-, and jumped off the mattress, knocking down flowers and teapots in the process; making a mess of my books, my paintings and my life, just before climbing to the window’s edge. For a brief moment I thought him a normal man and, fearing for his life (mine is a tall nest, far away from the noisy streets down below) I ran towards him. My naked, bewildered appearance must have startled him, because he jumped out, only to rise again, singing to the sun, utterly forgetting the night, the cold, the fog and my stupid refuge.

He left, rising to the horizon… and I, closing all windows, cursed this bad habit of mine: this going-about-saving-bird-men thing. Exhausted, I could scarcely begin to face the newspaper under the doormat, the starting of a new job day, or the dawn. “I will work the late afternoon shift”, I decided, and dragged myself back to bed. 

Traducción al inglés de este texto.
Fotos de Wara A. Godoy.