Fare adjustment mechanism

To quote Alda Merini, “Sin is never to be rejected”. Photo © Argus Paul Estabrook.

The Whys Not

Amo i colori, tempi di un anelito inquieto, irrisolvibile, vitale, spiegazione umilissima e sovrana dei cosmici perché del mio respiro. I love the colours, times of a restless, irresoluble, alive longing, the humblest and supreme explanation of the cosmic whys of my breath. Alda Merini

(English translation by Mado Flynn)

Paek YoungSu, Untitled, 1975. Courtesy of Vibes and Vistas.

Why and Because

Why do I love animals? Why do I love animals? Because I am one of them. Because I am the indecipherable figure of the grass, the panic of the deer running away, I am your great ocean and I am the smallest of insects. And I know all your creatures: they are perfect in this love that runs on the earth to arrive to you. Alda Merini

A greylag and its young gosling waddling around in the rain at Slimbridge wetlands, in Gloucestershire, South West England, UK. Photo: Ben Birchall/PA.

Infinite loop

Ninna nanna della guerra Ninna nanna, nanna ninna, er pupetto vò la zinna: dormi, dormi, cocco bello, sennò chiamo Farfarello Farfarello e Gujermone che se mette a pecorone, Gujermone e Ceccopeppe che se regge co le zeppe, co le zeppe d’un impero mezzo giallo e mezzo nero. Ninna nanna, pija sonno ché se dormi nun vedrai tante infamie e tanti guai che succedeno ner monno fra le spade e li fucili de li popoli civili Ninna nanna, tu nun senti li sospiri e li lamenti de la gente che se scanna per un matto che commanna; che se scanna e che s’ammazza a vantaggio de la razza o a vantaggio d’una fede per un Dio che nun se vede, ma che serve da riparo ar Sovrano macellaro. Ché quer covo d’assassini che c’insanguina la terra sa benone che la guerra è un gran giro de quatrini che prepara le risorse pe li ladri de le Borse. Fa la ninna, cocco bello, finché dura sto macello: fa la ninna, ché domani rivedremo li sovrani che se scambieno la stima boni amichi come prima. So cuggini e fra parenti nun se fanno comprimenti: torneranno più cordiali li rapporti personali. E riuniti fra de loro senza l’ombra d’un rimorso, ce faranno un ber discorso su la Pace e sul Lavoro pe quer popolo cojone risparmiato dar cannone! Lullaby of War Lullaby, lullaby, the baby wants titty: just be quiet, get to sleep, otherwise I call Farfarello Farfarello and Gujermone who is only another sheep in the herd, Gujermone and Ceccopeppe who does hold on to the wedges, the wedges of an empire half yellow and half black. Lullaby, close your eyes because if you sleep you will not see all the disgraces and troubles which befall in the world amongst swords and rifles of civilised peoples Lullaby, do not listen to the sighs and moans of people who slaughter each other in the name of a madman commander; people who kill and die for the sake of race or for the sake of a faith for an invisible god that serves as a shelter for the butcher king. Because that den of killers which causes our land to bleed knows all too well that the war is a great deal of money that prepares the resources for the thieves of the Bourses. Just be quiet, get to sleep, as long as this slaughter lasts: get to sleep, ’cause tomorrow we will see them kings again exchanging esteem and deference just as good friends as before. They are cousins and amongst relatives there’s no need for compliments: their personal relationships will come back more cordial than ever. And when they all will gather back together without the shadow of remorse, they will give us a beautiful speech about Peace and Work for all dumb people spared by the cannon! Trilussa, 1914

For the Best

“I accepted the evil and has become an incandescent dress. It has become poetry. It has become a fire of love for others”. Alda Merini, interview with Paolo Bonolis, Il senso della vita, Canale 5, Sunday, April 13, 2008

山本悍右 (Kansuke Yamamoto), 1949. Photo © Toshio Yamamoto, the Estate of Kansuke Yamamoto.

Between Scylla and Charybdis

Ogni mattina il mio stelo vorrebbe levarsi nel vento soffiato ebrietudine di vita, ma qualcosa lo tiene a terra, una lunga pesante catena d’angoscia che non si dissolve. Allora mi alzo dal letto e cerco un riquadro di vento e trovo uno scacco di sole entro il quale poggio i piedi nudi. Di questa grazia segreta dopo non avrò memoria perché anche la malattia ha un senso una dismisura, un passo, anche la malattia è matrice di vita. Ecco, sto qui in ginocchio aspettando che un angelo mi sfiori leggermente con grazia, e intanto accarezzo i miei piedi pallidi con le dita vogliose d’amore. Every morning my stem would rise in the wind blowing away drunk with life, but something holds it on earth, a long heavy chain of anguish which doesn’t dissolve. I then get out of bed and I look for a section of wind and I find a square of sun in which to rest my naked feet. Of this secret grace I will retain no memory because even illness has meaning, excess, movement, even illness is matrix of life. See, here I am on my knees waiting for an angel of grace to brush against me lightly, and meanwhile I caress my feeble feet with fingers longing for love. Alda Merini English translation by Stephanie Jed and Pasquale Verdicchio

“Stick together” (but not too much), “take care” (but do not exaggerate), “stay strong” (but, above all, stay human), “be kind” (but not servile). Photo: Richard Saker.

Tiptoeing in the Wind

Quelle come me Quelle come me regalano sogni, anche a costo di rimanerne prive. Quelle come me donano l’Anima, perché un’anima da sola è come una goccia d’acqua nel deserto. Quelle come me tendono la mano ed aiutano a rialzarsi, pur correndo il rischio di cadere a loro volta. Quelle come me guardano avanti, anche se il cuore rimane sempre qualche passo indietro. Quelle come me cercano un senso all’esistere e, quando lo trovano, tentano d’insegnarlo a chi sta solo sopravvivendo. Quelle come me quando amano, amano per sempre, e quando smettono d’amare è solo perché piccoli frammenti di essere giacciono inermi nelle mani della vita. Quelle come me inseguono un sogno quello di essere amate per ciò che sono e non per ciò che si vorrebbe fossero. Quelle come me girano il mondo alla ricerca di quei valori che, ormai, sono caduti nel dimenticatoio dell’anima. Quelle come me vorrebbero cambiare, ma il farlo comporterebbe nascere di nuovo. Quelle come me urlano in silenzio, perché la loro voce non si confonda con le lacrime. Quelle come me sono quelle cui tu riesci sempre a spezzare il cuore, perché sai che ti lasceranno andare, senza chiederti nulla. Quelle come me amano troppo, pur sapendo che, in cambio, non riceveranno altro che briciole. Quelle come me si cibano di quel poco e su di esso, purtroppo, fondano la loro esistenza. Quelle come me passano inosservate, ma sono le uniche che ti ameranno davvero. Quelle come me sono quelle che, nell’autunno della tua vita, rimpiangerai per tutto ciò che avrebbero potuto darti e che tu non hai voluto... Women like me Women like me give dreams, even at the cost of their own dreams. Women like me give their soul, because a lone soul is like a drop of water in the desert. Women like me offer a hand to help get up, even if they can fall for it. Women like me look forward, though their heart is always a few beats behind. Women like me seek for a meaning of existence, and if they find it, they try to teach that to people who are just surviving. Women like me, when they love, they love forever, and when they stop loving it is only because tiny fragments of being lie helpless in the hands of life. Women like me chase a dream to be loved for what they are and not for what one would like them to be. Women like me wander around the world in search of values gone by, now buried in the long ago of the soul. Women like me desire to change, but doing it would mean being born again. Women like me scream silently, so that their voice doesn’t get mixed up with tears. Women like me have a heart that you can always hurt, because you know they’ll let you go, without asking you anything. Women like me love too much, even knowing that in return they will pick only crumbs. Women like me nourish on little, and upon it — alas! — they founded their existence. Women like me go unnoticed, but they are who will really love you. Women like me are the ones who, in the autumn of your life, you will regret everything they could have given you and you didn’t let them... Alda Merini

Dane Shitagi, Ballerina Project. Photo: Dane Shitagi.

Stanzas

FURTHER STANZAS When, at your gesture, the last shreds of tobacco are extinguished in the glass plate, slowly rising to the ceiling are the coils of smoke at which the bishops and the knights gaze astounded from their chequered board; and other rings are following that are still lighter than those on your fingers. The mirage which sketches towers and bridges in the sky has vanished at the first breeze; the unseen window opens and the smoke is stirred. Down there below, another flock is on the move; a horde of men who do not recognize your incense, of whose chess board you alone compose the pattern. It was my former doubt that even to you the game might be unknown which transpires on the squares and now is cloud outside your doors: not cheaply to be soothed is mortal madness, if your eye’s flash is weak; it asks for other fires beyond the heavy curtains, which the god of chance foments for you when helpful. Today I know what you desire; subdued, the Martinella tolls, terrifying the ivory figurines with the spectral light of snows. But wins the prize of the lonely vigil he who can oppose, before the burning glass that blinds the pawns, your eyes of steel. Eugenio Montale, Le Occasioni, 1939 English translation by Edith Farnsworth

Will Barnet, Chess Game, 1973. Courtesy of Wichita Art Museum.

Time and Times and Half a Time

Non sono più quella di ieri, non so come sarò domani. Ma posso dirti come sono oggi, con i miei ieri. I am no longer who I was yesterday, I don’t know who I will be tomorrow. However, I can tell you who I am today, with all my yesterdays. Alda Merini

Film still from Ythlaf, 2018. © Phoebe Boswell.

The Privilege of Education

To mistake shit for chocolate is the privilege of the overeducated. Alda Merini English translation by Carla Billitteri

Meggan Joy, With Deception, 2020. Digital collage © Meggan Joy. Courtesy of Kolaj Magazine.

Blowin’ in the Wind

La calunnia è un vocabolo sdentato che quando arriva a destinazione mette mandibole di ferro. Calumny is a toothless word that, once it arrives at its destination, puts on iron jaws. Alda Merini

A hotel in downtown Toronto, Canada. Photo © Kennethy512.

The Visible and the Invisible

Ho acceso un falò nelle notti di luna per richiamare gli ospiti come fanno le prostitute ai bordi di certe strade, ma nessuno si è fermato a guardare e il mio falò si è spento. I lit a bonfire on moon nights to call guests like the prostitutes do on the edges of certain streets, but no one stopped to watch and my bonfire went out. Alda Merini

Auguste Rodin, Danaid, 1885. Courtesy of Artnet.

Secret Admirers

Ringrazio i miei nemici perché sono i più attenti a ciò che scrivo. I thank my enemies for they are the most attentive about what I write. Alda Merini

A pedestrian walks past a mural artwork painted on the wall of a house in the town of Ferizaj, Kosovo. Photo: AFP via Getty Images.

Thoughts in Words

The poet who sees everything is accused of freedom of thought. Il poeta che vede tutto viene accusato di libertà di pensiero. Alda Merini

Robots learn from humans, and so they adopt humans’ biases. Photo: Alamy.

Arcovazzi-two-point-zero

STATURA Er vecchio Nano de la pantomima, pe’ comparì più grande e importante se fece pijà in braccio dar Gigante: ma diventò più piccolo de prima. STATURE The old pantomime Dwarf, in order to look bigger and smarter threw himself into the arms of the Giant: but he became smaller than before. Trilussa

A turtle pokes its head out of the water in the Turtle Pond in Central Park at New York, United States. Photo: Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images.

I’m not smart, but I’m genius enough to know it

Il genio muore per se stesso e chiede d’esser sepolto entro memorie deboli. Genius dies for itself and ask to be buried in weak memories. Alda Merini

Antonio Ligabue, Leopard and black widow, oil on hardboard

Feriae Augusti

STATURA      Er vecchio Nano de la pantomima, pe’ comparì più grande e importante se fece pijà in braccio dar Gigante:      ma diventò più piccolo de prima. STATURE      The old pantomime Dwarf, in order to look bigger and more important threw himself into the arms of the Giant:      but he became smaller than before. Trilussa

Jealousy Incarnate

Photo by Felix Wong/SCMP

Othello Othello, red-voiced Othello, there’s no more time to turn the tide below: between death’s valleys, so green, and your wife, you changed the scheme. I look for the deep shadow of that demi-monde, and find the swamp, from here, turns blonde; another woman is next to you, another nature and within its cunning walls, you locked me as a prisoner. Alda Merini

Translation by Susan Stewart

A Name With No Name

Photo © 任航 (Rén Háng)

I tenderly loved some very sweet lovers without them knowing anything about it. And I wove spiderwebs from this and I always fell prey to my own creation. In me there was the soul of the prostitute of the saint of the one who lusts for blood and of the hypocrite. Many people gave a label to my way of life and all that while I was only an hysteric. Alda Merini English translation by Susan Stewart

Finding Nemo

Il paradiso non mi piace perché verosimilmente non ha ossessioni. I don’t like Paradise as they probably don’t have obsessions there. Alda Merini

English translation by Douglas Basford

A seaweed blenny – a small and usually bottom-dwelling fish recognizable by the branchlike cirri above its eyes – watches from the safety of its hiding spot off the coast of Brazil. Photo: Dan Lublinski/National Geographic Your Shot.