El cristiano / José Antonio Ramos Sucre

The Christian

I would see him every day sitting at the door of his shack and with his head in his hands, sunken in an intense reflection. He would appear in that position close to nighttime, when the region’s equal sky would alter itself slightly with thin clouds of amber and violet.
     He had lost the most fertile years of life in the suffering of prison, as a result of an unjust accusation. His honesty had been preserved intact and had redeemed him at the start of old age. His superiors had allowed him to build his house in an open field. He had insinuated himself in the friendship of his companions and had softened the law of his destiny, clarifying for them the promises of the Gospel.
     I would visit him with frequency and follow him in his pilgrimages to the edge of the sea of whales and ice floes. He had substituted his real name with a false one and justified himself alleging his humility and his intention of resembling the wave merging in the sea.
     He taught me charity with animals. Before his death, he found me worthy of protecting his two closest friends. I moved to my house, on my shoulders, the furnishings from his and sent ahead of me a blue polar fox and a silken hare.




Las formas del fuego (1929)




{ José Antonio Ramos Sucre, Obra completa, Caracas: Biblioteca Ayacucho, 1989 }