Sunday, November 15, 2015

Virgilio Piñera / The Mountain

El gigante
Arte callejero
La Habana, 2015
Fotografía de Triunfo Arciniegas

THE MOUNTAIN
by Virgilio Piñera
BIOGRAPHY
Translated by Daniel W. Koon


The mountain is three thousand feet tall. I have decided to eat it, bit by bit. It is a mountain like any other: vegetation, rocks, soil, animals and even humans beings that walk up and down its slopes. 

Every morning I throw myself upon it and start chewing on the first thing that crosses my path. I spend several hours at this. I return home with my body exhausted and my jaws distended. After a brief rest I sit in the doorway and gaze into the blue distance. 

If I told my neighbor about it he would surely laugh himself silly and take me for a madman. But being aware of what I am doing, I can very clearly see the mountain losing both heft and height. Soon they will be blaming geological disturbances. 

And that’s my tragedy: nobody will want to admit that it was I who was the devourer of the three-thousand-foot-tall mountain.


1957.


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