Findesferas: Chapter 1

The story of how the choguy bird came to be starts with an indigenous Guaraní boy, playing on a sunny day, who asks the orange tree if he can have one of its fruits. The wind that whistles through the tree replies that he can have all the oranges he wants if he only climbs along the branches. The boy, so pleased with this offer, begins to climb the tree, but as his mother sees what he’s doing she cries out ‘Ñanderú - guazú! Mirí, mirí! (My god! Little one! Little one!)’. The boy jumps to hear the cries of his mother, loses his grip on the branch and falls to the ground. The distraught mother runs to the boy to help him, but he does not regain consciousness, and she cries out in anguish. The boy has died. How the wind whistles now with such sadness! ‘And to think that I offered the boy all those oranges… Up he went along the branches, and couldn’t take a single one!’
Then God, knowing how much joy the boy brought to his mother, and how much he loved oranges, wakes him up in his mother’s arms and turns the little Guaraní boy into the choguy bird, who flies up high in the orange tree.
‘Cunumí! Guirá-mirí! (My son! A little bird!)’ exclaims the mother.
‘Choguy, choguy!’ says the boy.
Choguy, choguy, choguy, choguy,
que lindo va, que lindo es
perdiéndose en cielo guaraní.
How cute he is, how sweet he is, losing himself in the Guaraní sky.
Choguy, choguy, whistled the bird outside the window of young Juan and Matías, at two o’clock in the morning. To the twins, it was not the innocent call of the bird, but of the evil Kurupi, the stunted god with hairy feet, come to snatch them in the night. Their little hearts started pounding, Juan ran over to his brother and grabbed his arm as hard as he could, but Matías told him with a look that they could relax: the call was so close outside the window, so Kurupi was far away, as it was said. Juan watched in anticipation as Matías peered out to the ground beneath the mango tree outside. No fallen mangoes. The Kurupi was not in the tree. Close birdcall and no mangoes: neither of these were proof that the boys were safe from the Pombero, however.
They heard their grandmother, out on the porch, talking in a low voice in the dark. A strip of dim light from the window ran over Matías’ face, who looked at his brother in disbelief. Juan, confused, about to cry, shook his head as Matías took his hand in his and led him out the bedroom and slowly creeping down the stairs. Their grandmother’s voice grew in volume as they approached, and while the words had not yet taken form they had a repetitive tone like a chant. Juan pulled in the opposite direction from Matías, trying to ballast his brother’s foot from reaching the next step as they creeped closer and closer, down the stairs and to the cool kitchen tiles, crouching by the countertop. Their grandmother, back to the boys was bent over, hands on her thighs, gold rings catching the pale glow of streetlamps, whispering the same phrase over and over. As the boys approached, Juan’s nails cut little arcs in Matías’ arm, who used his strength not to cry out as they both saw that their grandmother was not alone, the outline of a small dwarf-like naked boy with straight and straw-like hair, the figure visible through the upside-down V of grandma’s legs, the strength of her stance giving conviction to her words:
‘Kuarahy Jára, take this caña paraguaya and these cigars, you will bring no harm to this family. Kuarahy Jára, take the gift I give you, do not harm my grandsons tonight.’
They crept back upstairs, afraid to turn their backs to the little beast in case he saw them, made it back to the bedroom and crawled into the same bed, limbs overlapping, Juan started to cry.
‘Shut up!’ hissed Matías.
‘What’s grandma doing?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘What’s going to happen to us?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’m here.’

(30 years later)

Oh, dear oh dearest captain!
Guide us the infinite!
How noble art thou captain,
And yet a piece of shit?

Where guidest us dear captain,
In dark day and deep night,
When deepest dark betrayal,
Cast thou in terrible light?

How beautiful the fair maiden,
Was never more than the fruit,
That bore your fair-haired wifey,
Before this awful pursuit?

How easily you cast off
The joy of yesteryear,
When verily your life’s work,
Was hardly ever so queer.

What will become of your bloodline,
When bloodline turn-ed to oil?
And oil began to grant thee
Grand plans and great turmoil.

O captain thou art brilliant,
But none so foul or fair,
Would burn thy lovely daughter,
To carbonaceous air.

How dare thee noble captain,
Play god with one so young?
Despite her overthinking
Incapable of fun.

O captain my old chum,
How far off fallest thou,
From the path on which we travel,
To the land beyond the clouds?

Please remedy me this!
Great lord of skies above!
How awful the proceedings
Like a twisted turtledove!

Of darkness we’ve seen plenty,
Few light and far between,
The gods and heavens sent me,
To save your precious teen!

Captain taught you me this,
That life is but a sphere,
It starts with an abyss,
And ends with doubtless fear.

O friend dear friend of mine,
Pray do explain me this,
How crushed you so your daughter,
Sent quick to darkest bliss?

Now ends this tragic tale,
And misdemeanours so
Dastardly that I failed,
We finish the fatal show

True, torture was aplenty,
And ruminations too,
What message we find if any,
Be short and sweet and true,

Were learn-ed more the nation,
And from the benefit,
Of silent contemplation,
Could we avoid a tale so fit,

To demonstrate our failure
As humans? We doth quiver:
Look out for your poor neighbours,
And from cruel fates deliver!

Juan had memorised the last stanza: he felt it had a grand feeling to it, a crescendo, and he all but sang it out looking expectantly at Matías, who stared unflinchingly down the scope of his πSniper , no target, just desperate not to meet Juan’s eyes.
‘…Is that it finished, then?’
‘Um, yeah. What did you think?’ Juan embarrassedly took out the map, and pretended to trace their advance from their position with his finger.
‘What’s it about?’
‘I’m not really sure, just going where my brain is.’
‘Right.’
‘There’s nothing out there, Matías.’
‘I know.’
Matías sighed, and turned to his brother, anxiously pushing a damp lock of hair out of his eyes with his piano fingers. ‘It’s shit, bro.’
Juan looked at him in astonishment. ‘That’s it?’
‘Okay, if you want some advice, don’t worry about it. You’ve got plenty of time to work on it while we’re out here.’
‘Ok… thanks.’
Down the scope of Matías’ rifle, the day was hot, wavy and silent. Every morning for the last few months, Juan and Matías would leave the base camp together to defend from a nearby skyscraper. They lay on the cool tiles and a pleasant breeze entered through the broken windows. It was beautiful up there, and one of Juan’s single remaining pleasures was to lie on his back and look out past the jagged shards and up at the sky, pretending he was a giant fly stuck to the ceiling and the floor was made of clouds. If the floor was clouds, you could be anywhere in the world, anywhere.
The war used to be panicky and confused, but over the years there was a noticeable decline in action. This was mostly because everyone had finally figured out what side they were on. It started as everyone’s one-man war against everyone else, and through all the disorder was a mass annihilation. Finally, the country leaders decided to do it the old-fashioned way and team up their countries against each other. This seemed the most logical type of war, which wasn’t really saying much at all.
Juan and Matías couldn’t even fight through the crazed civil wars in Paraguay. It was this same break out of civil war in Uruguay that was destroying its force against its bordering countries, Argentina and Brazil. After all the years, still there remained pockets of ignorant bliss: one could almost take a holiday in Montevideo and forget everything that had passed. For the soldiers, the best solution was just to wait, and find out slowly who the enemies were. Waiting was great and it was dull, and Juan had more than enough time to work on his poetry, but it just would not get better, and he knew why.
Matías rolled onto his back, searched through his pocket, in which he found:
1. A smashed lighter. All the lighter fluid was pooled together and saved for fuel purposes.
2. A tattered letter from Octavia. Matías was never sentimental about objects, but now felt that he had to be. They were the only close reminder of his wife at home. This object was sentimental indeed, but not something he otherwise would have kept.
3. A match, and a sandy rolled-up cigarette. Ah, there it is.
Matías lit the cigarette and puffed it into the still air above him. Little clouds ventured out of the broken building into the wind and the ash scattered about.
‘Can I tell you again?’
‘That’s the deal. Listen to my poetry and you can tell me when you want.’ Juan laid it out like that, but he would listen to his brother anyway: he did so long before he started writing poetry again.
‘Okay. I followed her to an art gallery. She was sweeping all this soft, brown draping clothing behind her, I saw how confidently she strode down the street, I didn’t even see her face.’ Pause. He had to get every detail just right, every time.
‘The grey streak of…’
‘Oh yeah, so her hair was jet black, but there was a grey streak of it that was blowing behind her, so shiny in the sun, just for me, I thought. I wasn’t surprised when she headed into the gallery, and then I knew she worked there. When she turned around, I thought she had the most beautiful face I’d ever seen, I promise you that. Angular in a really unusual way, but all the dips and troughs added up perfectly. I pretended I was interested in one of the paintings, but just to get talking to her. I saw the way she looked at me. She knew I didn’t care. I didn’t even look at any of them, just at her, I couldn’t tell you what they were now. She was laughing, all the time laughing, jingling her chunky jewellery about. All these different stones I’d never seen before, and I couldn’t tell how her clothes were divided up, just strange segmented layers of linen cloth wrapping her up from every direction. She had her own style. I knew she would be difficult.’
Juan thought about what a good brother he was, keeping Matías’ memory fresh about Octavia. But in his heart grew a terrible pain each time, each detail, each thought about her like a punch in the chest. Juan was a coward.
Later, the men were to return to the camp outside the city of Caacupé, where three fellow soldiers, Gustavo, Cesar and Marco, were sitting in a circle on sacks of yerba mate.
It was unofficially agreed by all that no conflict was to take place in the city. War was not reason enough to disrespect the city and its significance. Caacupé was a very important place for all of Paraguay. The story goes that an indigenous boy christened by missionaries by the name of José, headed out into the forest in search of timber. José was a happy boy, a woodcarving artist, ambitious and always learning new things. While gathering timber that day, José was distracted by the exotic sights and sounds of the birds and other animals on his journey, enjoying the warmth of the still air and the gentle bird calls all around. He strayed too far from home and lost his way. José was confident and resilient. He hid the wood he had collected in a safe place and carried on confidently along what he thought was the path back to his village, but hours passed, the night grew darker and José couldn’t even find where he hid the wood, let alone find his way out of the forest. Suddenly, he realised that the birds were silent, and now the sound of distant murmurs was carried through the air. José walked faster, away from the murmurs, but they did not die out. José was being followed. He ran, the cruel branches and vines of the many trees catching and cutting his arms and legs. His pursuers were a group of the godless mbayas, fearsome warriors. They whooped and laughed, speaking in an unfamiliar language, closing in on José, surrounding him as he stopped to rest behind a tree. José was spent, the hunt had gone on for too long. He was lost, didn’t know what to do. He prayed, ‘Oh holy virgin! If I escape with my life, I promise you that I will carve a beautiful wooden statue in your image with the very tree that protects me now.’ The warriors got closer to José’s tree, his heart pounding as he heard twigs snap underfoot not seconds away, and finally he saw the men. They stared at him. They stared through him. They continued on. José was safe! Once the men were far enough away, he hacked a decent chunk of the wood from the tree, now recognising where he was and walked safely back to the village to fulfil his promise. José made two statues of the virgin: one rests in the church of Tobatí and the other (the only image of the virgin with gold jewellery and real hair) in the Basilica of Caacupé, where hundreds of thousands of people would make a pilgrimage from the capital Asunción. The devout would do so on their knees.
As Juan and Matías lay high above in the broken skyscraper, a rival group of Paraguayans with an oily agenda were about to invade. Matías spotted them just quick enough as they appeared first as five small dots on the horizon,
Juan bolted down the stairs at an alarming speed, swinging off the banister and jumping three, four steps at a time, landing hard and bracing himself to absorb the shock but the pain accumulated as the numbers of the floors descended, he got to 20… the horses came nearer. Juan wanted to cry. Still he ran down, down the stairs, three men, Gustavo, Cesar, Marco, lives in his hands, come on! 15… at the field the rebel Paraguayans whooped, here they come, the soldiers turned and saw, running to the trenches, preparing to do battle, 10… oh god, thought Juan, my heart is exploding! He was sliding down now, two steps at a time, throwing his body weight forward to propel himself down in time… 5… It’s only five floors, use the lift shaft! They were all opened for emergencies, electricity long since switched off, Juan drew his sleeves over his hands and leaned forward onto the thick twisted wire, gripping tightly between sleeves and boots, firing down the cable sang ‘wheoooww, wheooohhwww’ and smack! Boots hit the floor and he ran with his remaining strength to the trenches.
Soon enough, bullets were whistling overhead. Juan crouched down in the trench, close to tears, clutching onto his rifle as if it was his brother’s arm. Matías lay on the cool tiles of floor, head and arms well above ground level, elegant fingers supporting the πSniper effortlessly, big docile cow eyes. The galloping hooves made the ground shake, and while Matías’ elbows were resting on the tiles, the scope was steady, and narrowing in on its target. There was a loud guttural foaming sound that cut through the static of the artillery fire as a πBullet caught Gustavo in the neck, and Juan, hearing his friend’s voice in the foam started to cry with anger, raised himself up enough to prop his πRifle on the lip of the trench, and looking in the opposite direction fired off a round that soared through the air landing square between the eyes of one of the enemy soldiers.
Matías, seeing this improbable act started to return fire, catching a horse in the flank that wildly shook off its rider. Cesar, leaning on the trench wall was breathing hard, πPistol raised by the side of his head, concentrating and judging the distance of the men by the sound of the horses. Marco was behind the sacks of mate, intermittently dipping over the top and firing a shot from his πRifle, but every time, nothing. Cesar’s breathing was now more rapid, his brow knitted, he scrambled above the trench, and Matías looking down the scope did not see him as he ran screaming at the remaining three men, zig-zagging as bullets almost caught his feet, chest and arm, firing wildly and hitting one man in the neck and another in the head. The last rider tugged hard on the reins and changed his path, trampling Cesar underhoof, closer and closer to the trenches he rode, galloping galloping, the men were waiting for a chance, a clear shot and crack! Marco popped back down behind the sacks for the last time. One man left, Matías fired off a shot that flew on a divine path, partitioning the air in all directions as it traded speed for altitude, flying down down from the window of the building across the streets of the city, a little golden bird of death, a soundspeed saviour, rifling pirouetting nearer nearer and softly parting flesh, spending but an instant in the assailant’s heart, then tearing out his back and like the newly dead man, but much faster, making its final home in the earth.
Juan heard the horse gallop onwards, where she may, and as the sound of hoofbeats faded asymptotically to nothing, he closed his eyes hard to force out the tears of loss for his departed friends.
It was a time before Matías made it out the skyscraper, walking at his own pace towards his brother, and slower still as he emerged from the shadow of a building into sunlight to indulge in the small pleasure of extra-terrestrial warmth. The pleasures were few. Large flapping insects passed his ears with a bell-shaped curve of vibrating insect noise, Doppler-dragged into lower tones as they trailed away behind them, and in that moment he felt his home, Paraguay, all around. Not the Paraguay of now, or before the war, but what Paraguay was, sunlight, warmth, buzzing insects, the timeless combination of senses that made up the almost imperceptible notion in his head of that elusive sensation, Paraguay.
He reached the trench, and with a sigh, grabbed a bag of mate and yanked his brother’s arm almost clean out of its socket, dragging him out of the trench and into the thicket of trees, not speaking, only performing.
The brothers sat, cross-legged, facing each other, Matías wiping the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve, Juan’s breathing no less rapid several minutes later, erupting into tears once again. Matías stared at him, furrowing his brow, then cranking back his arm as he gave his brother a vicious slap that rang out through the trees.
The waiting had done terrible things to them.
‘I hope you know that it was your fault.’
Juan’s mouth started to open, the tears on his face stopped in disbelief.
‘You were supposed to be watching from down there, but you just couldn’t leave me alone! What did you think you were doing in that building with me?’
‘What are you talking about? I’ve been there with you every day!’
‘Listen to what you’re saying! I can’t protect you all the time anymore, you’ll have to start looking after yourself.’
‘I…’
‘Quiet, you know what things there are in these forests.’
Juan touched his fingertips to his flushed cheek, trying to remember the last time his brother had slapped him like that. When he was five, probably.
The impatience, the years of disruption and the fleeting nature of safety and companionship was too much. Both the surviving men knew that. Neither of them had to try and understand Cesar’s actions, only sympathise. They were just one day away from running blindly at their enemies themselves, the fantasy of drawing their own wars to a desperate conclusion was just too tempting. What a pleasure it was to think it could be over one way or another, for good, never again.
Friendships and camaraderie had developed much faster than usual amongst the troop, and all that time spent doing nothing together had them convinced that they could ride out the war, return to their cities and continue on living as they had. They made plans and remembered birthdays, took turns preparing the breakfast, their whole system of living with its own in-jokes and nostalgic memories erased in an unfortunate meeting with some opposing soldiers. The brothers took time that they didn’t have to reflect in the forest, no safer here.
Right, what was the new plan then? Matías reached into Juan’s pocket and pulled out the map. Juan was better with the maps, but this was just a signal Matías was giving to wake him up a bit. Juan took the map back and pulled out his compass. ‘There is a village some miles from here’, said Juan in a wavering voice.
‘If we head east out of the forest, we can reach Ypacaraí in a few hours.’
‘Good.’
‘Matías… You shot someone.’
Matías sighed, placed a hand on his shoulder, flashed him a steely look.
‘It’s why you’re still here.’
An even more hideous whistle than that of the bullets began to plague the air. ‘Choguy, choguy’ said the trees. Losing himself in the Guaraní sky. ‘Choguy, choguy’, fainter and fainter each time. The brothers met eyes in silence, not breathing, rose to their feet. The gentlest rustle of leaves was unbearable as they walked towards the beams of light slicing through the trees, and Juan’s eyes started to well up again. The little arcs of his nails began to form on his brother’s arm, and Matías used the pain to focus as they patiently proceeded towards the light, out of the trees. As a mango fell to the ground, the two men stopped and closed their eyes. Matías shook his head ‘No, no’. Kurupi was fast approaching, the seductive stream of light getting closer as the men began to walk again, gently increasing their pace as the choguys got louder and louder before emerging from the thicket and breaking into a sprint in the direction of Ypacaraí.