Asphyxiation by Progress

From “Christopher Unborn,” by Carlos Fuentes, forthcoming, August, 1989, from Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

What will my baby breathe when he’s born?

The pulverized s--- of 3 million human beings who have no latrines.

The pulverized excrement of 10 million animals that defecate wherever they happen to be.

Eleven thousand tons per day of chemical wastes.

The mortal breath of 3 million motors endlessly puking puffs of pure poison, black halitosis, buses, taxis, trucks and private cars, all contributing their flatulence to the extinction of tree, lungs, throats and eyes.

“Pollution control?” Minister Robles Chacon exclaimed disdainfully. “Sure, when we’re a great metropolis with centuries of experience. Right now we’re growing, so we can’t stop, this is only our debut as a great city. We’ll regulate in the future.”

(WILL THERE BE A FUTURE? wonders the placard my proud father parades along Paseo de la Reforma.)

(WE HAVE BEEN A GREAT METROPOLIS SINCE 1325, says the second placard he proudly exhibits on the streets of the posh Zona Rosa.)

“Anti-pollution devices on cars and trucks?” indignantly exclaims minister-for-life Ulises Lopez. “And who’s going to pay for it? The government? We’d go broke. The private sector? What would we have left to invest? Or would you prefer that the gringo investors pay for that too? They’d be better off investing in Singapore or Colombia!”

“What will my son breathe?”

Mashed s---.

Carbonic gas.

Metallic dust.

And all of it at an altitude of about 1 1/2 miles, crushed under a layer of frozen air, and surrounded by a jail of circular mountains: garbage imprisoned.

Mama, your son’s eyes may also contemplate another circle of garbage surrounding the city: All it would take would be a match tossed carelessly onto the circular mass of hair, cardboard, plastic, rags, paper, chicken feet, and hog guts, to create a chain reaction, a generalized combustion that would surround the city with the flames of sacrifice, setting loose the feathered Valkyries who would, in a few minutes, consume all the available oxygen.