"Winter kept us warm"

Quando Don Chisciotte incontra le nuove mappe dell’inferno

Oggi, 18 anni fa, moriva Sir William Kingsley Amis. Bright November, Lucky Jim, Dear Illusion, Something Strange e The Old Devils sono trafitti da un’autunnale trasparenza che sa riorientare quell’insaziabile desiderio di comunione tra noi tutti.
 




Things tell less and less:
The news impersonal
And from afar; no book
Worth wrenching off the shelf.
Liquor brings dizziness
And food discomfort; all
Music sounds thin and tired,
And what picture could earn a look?
The self drowses in the self
Beyond hope of a visitor.
Desire and those desired
Fade, and no matter:
Memories in decay
Annihilate the day.
There once was an answer:
Up at the stroke of seven,
A turn round the garden
(Breathing deep and slow),
Then work, never mind what,
How small, provided that
It serves another's good
But once is long ago
And, tell me, how could
Such an answer be less than wrong,
Be right all along?
Vain echoes, desist.

(Kingsley Amis, Untitled)

"Rubrica - La parola del giorno"

to outsmart

"Riverside Blues"

Tired of a landscape known too well when young:
The deliberate shallow hills, the boring birds
Flying past rocks; tired of remembering
The village children and their naughty words,
He abandoned his small holding and went South,
Recognised at once his wished-for lie
In the inhabitants' attractive mouth,
The church beside the marsh, the hot blue sky.

Settled. And in this mirage lived his dreams,
The friendly bully, saint, or lovely chum
According to his moods. Yet he at times
Would think about his village, and would wonder
If the children and the rocks were still the same.

But he forgot all this as he grew older.

(Philip Larkin, Story)

 

 

Ancona

 

 

  

 

Arrivals. Re-start.

Delay, well, travellers must expect
Delay. For how long? No one seems to know.
With all the luggage weighed, the tickets checked,
It can't be long… We amble too and fro,
Sit in steel chairs, buy cigarettes and sweets
And tea, unfold the papers. Ought we to smile,
Perhaps make friends? No: in the race for seats
You're best alone. Friendship is not worth while.

Six hours pass: if I'd gone by boat last night
I'd be there now. Well, it's too late for that.
The kiosk girl is yawning. I fell stale,
Stupified, by inaction - and, as light
Begins to ebb outside, by fear, I set
So much on this Assumption. Now it's failed.

(Philip Larkin, Autobiography At An Air-station)

"Bacchanalia"

         Borgogna, prati, mowers, Larkin, Montrachet, Arnold, Darwin, taccuini, attese.

The evening comes, the fields are still.

The tinkle of the thirsty rill,

Unheard all day, ascends again;

Deserted is the half-mown plain,

Silent the swaths! the ringing wain,

The mower's cry, the dog's alarms,

All housed within the sleeping farms!

The business of the day is done,

The last-left haymaker is gone.

And from the thyme upon the height,

And from the elder-blossom white

And pale dog-roses in the hedge,

And from the mint-plant in the sedge,

In puffs of balm the night-air blows

The perfume which the day forgoes.

And on the pure horizon far,

See, pulsing with the first-born star,

The liquid sky above the hill! (...)

The world but feels the present's spell,

The poet feels the past as well (...) 

(Bacchanalia, Matthew Arnold)

bell,

cell,

hell,

sell,

smell,

tell,

shell,

farewell.

The mower stalled, twice; kneeling, I found
A hedgehog jammed up against the blades,
Killed. It had been in the long grass.

I had seen it before, and even fed it, once.
Now I had mauled its unobtrusive world
Unmendably. Burial was no help:

Next morning I got up and it did not.
The first day after a death, the new absence
Is always the same; we should be careful

Of each other, we should be kind
While there is still time.

(The Mower, Philip Larkin)

"Everything's ending here"

Summer is fading:
The leaves fall in ones and twos
From trees bordering
The new recreation ground.
In the hollows of afternoons
Young mothers assemble
At swing and sandpit
Setting free their children.

Behind them, at intervals,
Stand husbands in skilled trades,
An estateful of washing,
And the albums, lettered
Our Wedding, lying
Near the television:
Before them, the wind
Is ruining their courting-places

That are still courting-places
(But the lovers are all in school),
And their children, so intent on
Finding more unripe acrons,
Expect to be taken home.
Their beauty has thickened.
Something is pushing them
To the side of their own lives.

(Afternoons, Philip Larkin)

"Sovversivismo dall'alto - palinodia del tempo presente"

Nel mio bicchiere girano due

cani neri che si incontrano

per poi azzuffarsi.

A volte conversano tra loro,

forse senza capirsi in fondo.

Altre volte, fino a che viene buio

fischiano, o farfugliano.

A volte convivono solo

nello spazio di un mattino,

si ottenebrano ingenuamente

nell’attesa di un salto per

giocare insieme.

L’inutilità sembra la loro destinazione,

il loro incrocio, speranza di fabulosity.

"In retrospect"

L’insetto dell’estate è tornato,

si aggira qui attorno in questo mondo

tribolato; volato in alto se n’è il sacro

e il tetto saldo

guarda la carne e il soldo.

I legami son perduti

tra le lacrime dei tuoi aiuti;

gli anacoluti di questa terra

anche loro si sono astenuti

da questa guerra, imbevuti in

un cielo sbiancato dagli

immobilismi.