The Vet and Platero

Platero and I

Platero is a small donkey, a soft and hairy donkey. So soft to the touch that he might be said to be made of cotton without bones. Only the jet black mirrors of his eyes are hard and like two crystal scarabs.

I turn him loose, and he goes to the meadow and with his nose, he gently caresses the little flowers of rose and blue and gold.... I call him softly, "Platero?" and he comes to me at a gay little trot that is like laughter of a vague, idyllic, tinkling sound...

He eats whatever I give him. He likes mandarin oranges, amber-hued muscatel grapes, purple figs tipped with crystalline drops of honey...

He is as loving and tender as a child, but strong and sturdy as a rock. When on Sundays I ride him through the lanes in the outskirts of the town, slow-moving countrymen, dressed in their Sunday clean, watch him a while, speculatively:

—"He is like steel," they say.

Steel, yes. Steel and moon silver at the same time.

 White Butterflies

Night falls, hazy and purple. Vague green and mauve luminosities persist behind the tower of the church. The road ascends full of shadows, of bells, of the fragrance of grass, of songs, of weariness, of desire. Suddenly a dark man wearing a cap and carrying a pick, his face red for an instant in the light of his cigarette, comes toward us from the wretched but that is lost in piles of coal sacks. Platero is afraid.

"Carrying anything?"

"See for yourself.... White butterflies."

The man wants to stick his iron pick in the little basket, and I do not prevent him. I open the knapsack, and he sees nothing in it. And the food for the soul passes, candid and free, without paying tribute to the customs.

One of the reasons why I became a vet was Platero...

Platero was a donkey from a book written by a spanish poet called Juan Ramon Jimenez who had to escaped into exile like many others upon the outbreak of the civil war.

The book “Platero and I” is read in the Spanish primary schools and leaves a sweet flavour and a powerful love for nature in the hearts of all the children throughout their infancy.

I loved Platero...the donkey (symbol of tenderness, purity and innocence).. ,we all wanted Platero ,wanted to hug him, caress him and give him apples and carrots..

The whole book is a great depiction of the Spanish way of thinking and living in a small village with the Sunday dresses and muscatel wine.

This was one of my first contacts with nature in a vocational way. I thought that I would love to be surrounded by Plateros all my life, making them feel better and helping them to forget the sadness of being stray without an owner,

So I guess I will be reading “Platero and I” to my daughter once again and I can’t wait to see her eyes when I tell her that Platero is coming, strolling around the Spanish, sunny countryside with the smell of the Jara plant and charcoal burning, in the shade of an olive tree, calling Platero smoothly so that he comes again.

For information about donkeys and how to adopt one, please visit http://www.thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk/