* * *
—Poetry by Ivan Pozzoni, Monza, Italy
—Photos of Monza Courtesy of Public Domain
—Photos of Monza Courtesy of Public Domain
HOTEL ACAPULCO
Le mie mani, scarne, han continuato a batter testi,
trasformando in carta ogni voce di morto
che non abbia lasciato testamento,
dimenticando di curare
ciò che tutti definiscono il normale affare
d’ogni essere umano: ufficio, casa, famiglia,
l’ideale, insomma, di una vita regolare.
Abbandonata, nel lontano 2026, ogni difesa
d’un contratto a tempo indeterminato,
etichettato come squilibrato,
mi son rinchiuso nel centro di Milano,
Hotel Acapulco, albergo scalcinato,
chiamando a raccolta i sogni degli emarginati,
esaurendo i risparmi di una vita
nella pigione, in riviste e pasti risicati.
Quando i carabinieri faranno irruzione
nella stanza scrostata dell’Hotel Acapulco
e troveranno un altro morto senza testamento,
chi racconterà la storia, ordinaria,
d’un vecchio vissuto controvento?
* * *
HOTEL ACAPULCO
My emaciated hands continued to write,
turning each voice of death into paper.
That he left no will,
forgetting to look after
what everyone defines as the normal business
of every human being: office, home, family,
the ideal, at last, of a regular life.
Abandoned, back in 2026, any defense
of a permanent contract,
labelled as unbalanced,
I’m locked up in the centre of Milan,
Hotel Acapulco, a decrepit hotel,
calling upon the dreams of the marginalized,
exhausting a lifetime's savings
in magazines and meagre meals.
When the Carabinieri burst
into the decrepit room of the Hotel Acapulco
and find yet another dead man without a will,
who will tell the ordinary story
of an old man who lived windbreak?
Le mie mani, scarne, han continuato a batter testi,
trasformando in carta ogni voce di morto
che non abbia lasciato testamento,
dimenticando di curare
ciò che tutti definiscono il normale affare
d’ogni essere umano: ufficio, casa, famiglia,
l’ideale, insomma, di una vita regolare.
Abbandonata, nel lontano 2026, ogni difesa
d’un contratto a tempo indeterminato,
etichettato come squilibrato,
mi son rinchiuso nel centro di Milano,
Hotel Acapulco, albergo scalcinato,
chiamando a raccolta i sogni degli emarginati,
esaurendo i risparmi di una vita
nella pigione, in riviste e pasti risicati.
Quando i carabinieri faranno irruzione
nella stanza scrostata dell’Hotel Acapulco
e troveranno un altro morto senza testamento,
chi racconterà la storia, ordinaria,
d’un vecchio vissuto controvento?
* * *
HOTEL ACAPULCO
My emaciated hands continued to write,
turning each voice of death into paper.
That he left no will,
forgetting to look after
what everyone defines as the normal business
of every human being: office, home, family,
the ideal, at last, of a regular life.
Abandoned, back in 2026, any defense
of a permanent contract,
labelled as unbalanced,
I’m locked up in the centre of Milan,
Hotel Acapulco, a decrepit hotel,
calling upon the dreams of the marginalized,
exhausting a lifetime's savings
in magazines and meagre meals.
When the Carabinieri burst
into the decrepit room of the Hotel Acapulco
and find yet another dead man without a will,
who will tell the ordinary story
of an old man who lived windbreak?
Monza, Italy
THE ANTI-PROMISE TO LOVE
Anti-poet, victim of my anti-poetry,
all I could do is dedicate to you an anti-promise of
love,
my anti-promise of love would have the features of
a synesthesia,
the Stalinist hardness of steel and the softness of
colour,
the finesse of friendship and the consistency of love,
your white eyes turn me into a hydrophobic cynic,
and there's no doctor for rage, my love.
An anti-promise of love to be read before a registrar,
so as to convince a techno-trivial world,
I’ve loved you since June 1976, perhaps, in truth,
since April,
I was an embryo and you were still immersed in
the aurora borealis,
for six years you would have been an angel, a ghost,
the inessential of a fractal,
without batting an eyelid waiting for you, six years,
thirty-six years, with nothing to say,
the sheep of Panurge's contemporaries would
condemn me to total silence.
You are my anti-promise of love, and the idea may
seem imperceptible to you,
I observe you sleeping, serene, like a crumb abandoned
in a toaster,
my love, I am stripped of the role of ‘sapper’ —it is
abyssmal like a submarine,
condemned to scatter torpedoes under the (false)
guise of a dogfish.
Palace of Monza
IGNITE TOMB
Corpse No. 2,
the shadow of the wave reflected in my right retina,
hands clenched to grasp Mediterranean sands
worn under red surfing bermudas.
Corpse No. 7,
muffled screaming attempts at the pit of my stomach
Marrakech hash maps in my pockets,
scanty dirhams sown between my purse and trousers,
led me to the mouth of the abyss.
Corpse No. 12,
‘Eloi, Eloi, lemà sabactàni’,
I don't remember who was shouting it to whom,
not being versed in the Koran:
I too died invoking it in vain.
Corpse No. 18,
retreating on the roads between the dunes of
Misrata,
in thirsty slalom between friendly and enemy
missiles,
and dying of water.
Corpse No. 20,
although nomads, like me, sway
on desert ships, detonated fluids,
never will they get used to drowning.
Every grave of the unknown migrant
whispers that it is hard to embrace
a death that comes from the sea.
I DON'T FIT IN
I don't fit in, I have a borderline personality disorder
I give out elbows like Greg ‘The Hammer’ Valentine,
if I don't apply myself I'll never be able to aspire to
the Nobel Prize
irreducible deutoplasma among Hegel's black cows.
I don't fit in, I have a schizophrenic delusion
I hate the people and dip my pen in arsenic,
I sing, outside the choir, like an X-Factor mythomaniac
defusing bombs and dealing with a metal detector.
I don't fit in, I’ve got a killer's disposition,
I wander between the zombies, style King of Pop in
“Thriller”,
flying at low altitude I quote quotes of quotients,
forced to pack subtitles for non-users.
I don't fit in, I have all sorts of phobias,
in the queue I crave the green, like a virtuous
dendrophile,
setting the world on fire, blurring time with the
zoom,
I surrender myself to the obsolescence of consecutio
temporum.
setting the world on fire, blurring time with the
zoom,
I surrender myself to the obsolescence of consecutio
temporum.
THEY EAT VOICES
If they have white paper, the new writers who sing
without a Muse,
would rival Géricault in his Raft of the Medusa.
Italian art has become an assault on the pot,
more fulfilled in the ‘brothel’ than the members of
a porn film,
so in the Poetryweb the actor is confused with a
stallion
full of anachronistic texts fit for the cover of
Le Ore.
Lyrical democracy must not be a two-bit lyric,
it is essential to study and it is not forbidden to go
deeper,
all of them now strictly improvising, equipped
with a notepad,
as if they should sign up for rather
than culture.
To write on the www we should set up an entry test,
It's forbidden to touch the keyboard on pain of
sudden death,
not suitable for late modern art, Lucini teaches, his
revolver at his head,
the incurable disease of the turn of the century is
called Adsl.
_______________________
Today’s LittleNip:
EPIMILLIGRAMMA
—Ivan Pozzoni
Non ti devi incazzare se, a volte, ti nomino,
sai, t’ho reso immortale come un «ritratto
d’anonimo».
Incide meglio il mio inchiostro che una ciotola
di cicuta:
senza che nessuno lo sappia la tua fama si è evoluta.
* * *
EPIMILLIGRAMME
—Ivan Pozzoni
You don't have to put yourself in color if you
look at your name,
you know, I'll make you immortal in “portrait
d'anonyme”.
My ink cuts better than a bowl of hemlock—
without anyone knowing your fame has evolved.
_____________________
Newcomer Ivan Pozzoni was born in Monza, Italy, in 1976. He has written 150 volumes, and 1000 essays, and founded an avant-garde movement (NéoN-avant-gardisme). Between 2007 and 2018, his books were published: Underground and Riserva Indiana, Versi Introversi, Mostri, Galata morente, Carmina non dant damen, Scarti di magazzino, Here the Austrians are more severe than the Bourbons, Cherchez the troika, and others. He was the founder and director of the literary magazines, Il Guastatore and L'Arrivista; he is the editor-in-chief of the international philosophical magazine, Información Filosófica; he is, or has been, creator of the series, Esprit (Limina Mentis); Nidaba (Gilgamesh Edizioni); and Fuzzy (deComporre). His verses have been translated into French, English and Spanish, and he is included in the Atlas of Contemporary Italian Poets of the University of Bologne. Welcome to the Kitchen, Ivan, and don’t be a stranger!
____________________
—Medusa, enjoying a little Italian this morning...
Ivan Pozzoni
A reminder that
MoSt in Modesto will have
its Members Potluck and Open Mic
tonight, 6pm.
For more about this and other
future poetry happenings in
Northern California and otherwheres,
click on
UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS
(http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html)
in the links at the top of this page—
and keep an eye on this link and on
the daily Kitchen for happenings
that might pop up
—or get changed!—
during the week.
Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.
Find previous four-or-so posts by scrolling down
under today; or there's an "Older Posts" button
at the bottom of this column; or find previous poets
by typing the name of the poet or poem
into the little beige box at the top
left-hand side of today’s post; or go to
Medusa’s Rapsheet at the bottom of
the blue column at the right
to find the date you want.
Would you like to be a SnakePal?
Guidelines are at the top of this page
at the Placating the Gorgon link;
send poetry and/or photos and artwork
to kathykieth@hotmail.com. We post
work from all over the world—including
that which was previously published—
and collaborations are welcome.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!
MoSt in Modesto will have
its Members Potluck and Open Mic
tonight, 6pm.
For more about this and other
future poetry happenings in
Northern California and otherwheres,
click on
UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS
(http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html)
in the links at the top of this page—
and keep an eye on this link and on
the daily Kitchen for happenings
that might pop up
—or get changed!—
during the week.
Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.
Find previous four-or-so posts by scrolling down
under today; or there's an "Older Posts" button
at the bottom of this column; or find previous poets
by typing the name of the poet or poem
into the little beige box at the top
left-hand side of today’s post; or go to
Medusa’s Rapsheet at the bottom of
the blue column at the right
to find the date you want.
Would you like to be a SnakePal?
Guidelines are at the top of this page
at the Placating the Gorgon link;
send poetry and/or photos and artwork
to kathykieth@hotmail.com. We post
work from all over the world—including
that which was previously published—
and collaborations are welcome.
Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!
