This poem has disappeared from this website. To hear a reading click on the audio player below:
To read more poetry by Bonnie McClellan, click HERE.
Tag: Leap of Faith
A petal from ‘California Notebooks’: by Anna Mosca
Trova questa poesia QUI.
The English version of this poem has disappeared from this website but it can now be found HERE.
A reading of the poem by the poet can be heard by clicking on the player below:
(translation by Bonnie McClellan) You can read more of Anna Mosca’s “California Notebooks” by clicking HERE. Leggi più dei “quaderni californiani” di Anna Mosca QUI.
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Ultimo cliente di Giacomo Gusmeroli
L’armonia nascosta è superiore alla manifesta
(Eraclito)
Ultimo cliente
I
Chiese di passargli il 41 delle Clark dallo scaffale.
Edith le fece ripetere il numero. Salii io sulla scala, sfilai
……………………………………………………………………………..[la scatola
e diedi il polacchino blu al cliente.
Erano le 19e30 sul mio orologio e dissi a Edith cosa provava.
……………………………………………………………………………..[Ella
accennò un sorriso e rifletté che era ora di chiudere. Dopo
………………………………………………………………………… [aver tolto
la chiave dalla toppa gliela consegnai.
Mi abbracciò e disse:
“Non porti niente…”
“Non mi serve nulla”
risposi.
“ In questo viaggio non voglio servire a due padroni”.
II
dapprima mi si levò
davanti…
…un acro di terra abbandonato sotto
la rupe. Compivo trent’anni.
Ero come un giglio del campo
quando l’ho visto infestato
di arastre spinescenti e mi piaceva
lo squarcio al confine
con il carruggio
per il Par Impusibèl,
di ciliegi e rosmarino selvatico.
E lì, me ne stavo con braghe
da spaventapasseri, e ogni tanto
negli attimi spogli guardavo
il gran cielo notturno
come da ragazzo
la prima notte d’alpeggi
accosciato sulla specola.
III
Poi nei mesi della Verna restavo
nella mia preghiera austera e sola
volevo molto e chissà volevo
fossero veri davanti
a Lui i miei sogni. Ma niente
era già terminato
dinamico era ogni divenire
e nella lotta maturai. Solo
andare, dovevo, e nessuna
certezza era più lontana
e imparare dai fatti,
come bambino cominciare ancora,
e se fu doloroso per quell’allora;
ora è il presente ed è il quotidiano,
è il tempo,
il senso…
IV
– E chi te lo ha fatto fare, a te, di mollare tutto?
Parecchi mi interrogavano così:
– E – aggiungono, poi all’istante
– è troppo complesso, per dire, –
risparmiandomi la risposta:
con gli amici, invece
dissotterro il dubbio, (che è dar braccio
al passo difficile) della verità.
Mentre al Gianmario, dopo mesi, vicino alla tomba
di Carlo Carretto, ho detto che cerco
la mia religiosità:
– E la mia arte.
“The harmony hidden is superior to that manifest”
(Heraclitus)
Last customer
I
She asked that I pass her the Clark’s in a 9-1/2 from the shelf
Edith asked her to repeat the size. I went up the ladder, slid out
[the box
and gave the blue ankle boots to the client.
It was 7:30 pm by my watch and I asked Edith what she thought.
[And she
with a slight smile agreed that it was time to close. After
[having taken
the key from the lock, I gave it to her.
She hugged me and said:
“You won’t take anything…”
“I won’t need anything”
I replied.
“On this voyage I don’t want to serve two masters”.
II
at first arose
before me…
…an acre of abandoned land below
the scarp. I was thirty.
I was as a lily of the field
when I saw it overrun
with briars and I liked
the opening where it bordered
the beaten path
to the Seemingly Impossible,
wild cherries and rosemary.
And there, I stayed with scarecrow
trousers, and every so often
in bare moments I looked
at the broad night sky
as when as a boy I passed
my first night in the high alps
hunkered in the observatory.
III
Then in the Vernal months I stayed
alone within my austere prayers
I wanted much and who knows I wanted
that they were true before
Him, my dreams. But nothing
was already done
everything yet to become in motion
and in the battle I matured. Only
to go, I had to, and no
certainty was more distant
and learning through doing,
beginning again as a child,
and if it were a painful then,
now it is a daily present,
it is time,
sense…
IV
– And who made you do it, you, let it all go?
Many have interrogated me so:
– And – then they add, at the moment
– it is too complex, to say, –
sparing me my response:
with my friends
I unearth instead my doubt, (which is to offer a hand
through a difficult pass) of the truth.
While to Gianmario, months later, near the grave
of Carlo Carretto, I said I was in search of
my devotion:
–And my art.
(translated by Bonnie McClellan)
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There I was…: by Tom McClellan (1941 – 2013)
This poem will remain posted as a memorial to poet Tom McClellan who passed away in August of 2013. A reading of the poem can be heard by clicking on the player below:
There I was in the madhouse again,
That summer you remember as the one it didn’t rain
So long the paper ran front page ads for the record-breaking
Drought. Every morning I’d stare into the hard hot sunrise through
Brown tinted shatterproof ––
Your brain finally tells you the crepe myrtle blooms
Eight stories down are really pink despite your eyes.
One day the clouds at last
Gathered low and dark and spat spare droplets on that mirrored barrier ––
Then summer’s fever broke, and I watched my tears
Land and gather thick and run down what kept me from feeling
Rain.
Copyright Tom McClellan 2001 ~ all rights reserved
To read more poetry and prose by Tom McClellan, visit his blog HERE.
Bonnie McClellan-Broussard 