First Voices
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Night
The sun never ceased shining and the Cashinahua Indigenous did not know the sweetness of rest.
Greatly in need of peace, exhausted by so much light, they asked for the loan of night from The Rat.
It got dark, but The Rat’s night lasted only long enough to eat and smoke a little before the fire. Dawn arrived just as the Indigenous were settling into their hammocks.
So then, they tried The Tapir’s nighttime. With his night, they could sleep deeply and they enjoyed the long dreams they so wished for. But when they woke up, so much time had passed that the weeds from the woods had invaded their crops and crushed their houses.
After much more searching, they settled upon the nighttime of The Armadillo. They asked him for the loan of it, and never gave it back.
The Armadillo, stripped of night, now sleeps during the day.
Translation ©2023. Terence Clarke. All rights reserved.
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About Eduardo Galeano? click here. For a selection of Galeano’s books, click here.
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