In the neighborhood of La Boca, in Buenos Aires, where houses are dressed in colors but souls sometimes walk gray, lived Iñaki, a silent sweeper of almost sixty years.

No one knew much about him. Only that he was sweeping since before dawn, that he didn’t talk to almost anyone, and that he carried a backpack always full, even though he didn’t stop in markets or warehouses.

Until one autumn afternoon, while that porteño wind was blowing that seems to bring things from other times, Iñaki dropped his backpack by accident. And from the inside… books fell.

Folded books, broken books, books without covers. But books.

A girl saw him and screamed:

—Look, the sweeper carries a library!

He smiled, for the first time in years, and picked up the books gently.

– I don’t carry them. I saved them – he said.

Since then, rumor swept around the neighborhood: the man sweeping the street not only picked up dry leaves, but also rescued live leaves. I found them thrown among the trash, wet by the rain, forgotten on stairs, on benches, on portals.

I was cleaning them off. I was drying them off. I was putting tape on them. And I read them.

Every night, after his shift, Iñaki would go to a hidden square and place his books on an old wooden table. I was turning on a small flashlight. And he sat and read aloud, for no one in particular.

But the wind, once again, played a messenger.

A young man heard it one night reading “The Little Prince” with a paused voice.

He sat down.

Then came two old ladies

Teenager with earphones who took them off for the first time.

And a mother with her daughter, who kept asking questions.

—Where do you get those books?

—From where many throw them. As if they don’t work.

—And why are you reading them here?

– Because everything that is picked up from the ground… deserves to get up again.

Over time, more people got closer. And they called him The Librarian. They were donating used books to him. He used to share them. Every night, in the same square, I placed a sign:

“If you need it, take it. If you loved it, give it back. If it changed on you… count it. ”

And many counted.

A boy who couldn’t read, learned from him.

A grieving woman laughed again thanks to a poem.

An old man felt again, with a story that reminded him of his youth.

Iñaki didn’t get famous. He never meant to be. He continued sweeping the streets, waving with a head gesture, walking in his humble steps.

But one afternoon, when his body was hurting more than before, a group of neighbors placed a small wooden house next to the square. In it they painted their words:

“Everything that is picked up from the ground… deserves to get up again. ”

And inside, they left hundreds of rescued books.

Today, that street library is named: “The Wind Library.”

Because it was the wind that brought him the books.
And it was the soul of Iñaki that sowed them again.