Calle Beleño

Henbane is a plant with a downy stem and yellowish flowers veined in violet that grows in ditches and waste ground. In its leaves and seeds it holds alkaloids such as atropine and scopolamine: in small doses they eased toothache; past the measure, they brought on delirium, hallucinations and death. That double face explains its fame. In the Middle Ages it was called the witches' herb, for it went into the ointments that, rubbed on the skin, produced the sensation of lightness and flight tied to the flying broomsticks. The street belongs to a group of streets in the Hispanoamérica district named after plants; what remains is the word and the plant that holds it up, able to heal and to kill depending on the hand that measures it.