G A M M M

MANALIVE

There are men departing only at stations
on the long autumn trains, IT IS
SECRETELY FORBIDDEN TO LIVE IN MIRRORS,
on the silver tracks
sunrises and sunsets whine
like a distant cicada.

………………………………At Easter
a postcard from Hamburg will reveal they have put on some weight,
it will be on us to take care of plantations
deserted by lemons – and to drive out
the encamped circus, Murillo’s children,
the gipsy woman reading
hands among the bougainvilleae

while she shepherds the Camel who defeated the Eye-of-the-Needle.

*

SHELL

……..In the dried out
city seasons die at dawn, without
ankles, when within a hundred walls
traffic lights light up
a silent street
or on the rooftops the white
sleepwalker hides a comet
in the new jar. Tonight
we’ll bet ouselves […]

_____________________
[ from Nanni Balestrini’s Osservazioni sul volo degli uccelli: Poesie 1954-1956, Scheiwiller, Milano 1988. Translation by Damiano Abeni ]