My Two Worlds by Sergio Chejfec

unperturbed, at least that was what I supposed, because it was impossible to verify that they were looking at anything in particular. And something else that surprised me was the fact that the sparrows, despite their small build, which would have allowed them to avoid obstacles and fly comfortably between the bars into the cages, crept in slowly, as if they wanted to remain unnoticed, and so make their giant relatives think they belonged to a different species.
    The labels with the names of the birds were green with small white letters. The scientific names had a certain morphological resonance for me, but I found the popular names more picturesque, for these were indigenous, or half-adapted, names, which in my imagination recalled divinities or characters from the native mythology, lore that still resonated for the inhabitants of the deep jungles and the great savannas, or had once done so. The only vivid colors to be seen in the darkness were, as I said, the beaks of the raptors and the piles of meat, the former red as well, for the most part, so that one’s gaze fell involuntarily and every so often on those two points.
    I was busy verifying these impressions when I saw an older, almost elderly woman who was approaching me from one side, presumably to tell me something. Her hair was graying and she wore loose-fitting clothes, as if she lived near the park and had only to put on a presentable bathrobe to visit. Nonetheless, she carried an elegant pocketbook and another object I can’t identify now, which at the time seemed like a flimsy parcel, made from used paper or plastic bags. When she reached me, she asked why the aviary was closed, she had made a special trip from home and now discovered that she couldn’t get in. I couldn’t think of an answer. My first reaction was to conceal the hand holding the map, because I was afraid she would realize I was a visitor and rule me out as a possible helper.
    There was the sign in front of us showing the visiting hours and the day the aviary was closed, but since I was a stranger in town it occurred to me that the sign could be old or that there it was customary to ignore it, and that the neighborhood woman was asking me about something else, a more fundamental matter, or for some news that wasn’t immediately obvious. I was about to tell her I didn’t know, but instead pointed to the sign indicating the aviary was closed, or maybe told her at the same time that I didn’t know; in truth, I don’t remember all that well. Whatever the case, for a brief moment the two of us stood waiting for something to happen. Then, as it tends to occur, there was a screech of a bird from above, half-mixed with the revving of a distant motor. I began to think: the coincidence was too great for the sign to be incorrect; so despite its being my first time in the park and at this aviary, which I would be unable to visit any time soon, or maybe ever, since I planned to leave the city the following day, I once more relayed the first and probably last piece of information I’d acquired on this subject, and I told her that the place was closed on Mondays. By way of argument I pointed to the sign once more.
    As has happened to me on other occasions, and continues happening to this day, the woman thought it reasonable to ignore me. Something about the way I speak must cause this; it’s probable that my lack of conviction in saying even the most obvious things, or the things I most believe in, works against me at times. Most likely, I thought, the parcel she’s carrying has food for the birds who spend their entire lives caged and eating nothing but the same old ground meat. She told me she knew it was closed on Mondays. To that I could only insist that today was a Monday. It was a fact I could be sure of despite being a stranger in town, because obviously it was Monday in all of Brazil and the rest of the continent. She stood there thinking, and I noticed how for a fraction of a second she was