La Luz Mala: The Ghost Lights of the Argentine Countryside
On the flat immensities of the Argentine campo—where the horizon is a perfect circle, the nearest neighbor a league off, and the night sky comes down to the grass on every side—a light where no light should be is an event of the first order. The gauchos and the country people of the interior have a name for it, and the name is a verdict: la luz mala , the evil light. It appears after dark, most often in the dry months and by old superstition thickest around the feast of Saint Bartholomew at the end of August —the one day of the year, says the folk calendar, when the devil goes loose; it hovers at grass height or drifts above the fields, white, yellowish, or pale blue; it recedes when approached and follows when fled; and the whole weight of the tradition speaks through the standing counsel given to every child of the interior: do not ride toward it . For the luz mala, in the belief of the countryside, is no lantern and no traveler. It is a soul in pain —an alma en pena : the light of ...