“I’m afraid that my breathing/ too will sleep: I spy it/ I hold it I am terrified/ come back breath come back!…”
| I platani del viale Nelo Risi I platani del viale fanno da paralume al lampione, ritagliano foglie sul mio lettino nel buio conto le pecorine se gioco se parlo se mangio neanche me ne accorgo però non è la prima volta che lo sento ingigantire. Mi si chiudono gli occhi e non riesco a dormire temo che si addormenti anche il respiro; lo spio lo trattengo ne ho terrore torna respiro torna! fin- chè un soffio dopo l’altro l’inciampo si attenua la mente si distrae… Il respiro ritorna abituale. | The plane trees on the boulevard Nelo Risi The plane trees on the boulevard are lampshades for the streetlamp, they cut out leaves on my little bed in the darkness I count sheep if I play if I speak if I eat I don’t even notice but it isn’t the first time that I feel it get bigger. My eyes are getting heavy and I can’t sleep I’m afraid that my breathing too will sleep: I spy it I hold it I am terrified come back breath come back! un- til one breath after the other the catch relaxes my mind is distracted… My breathing goes back to normal. Translation ©Matilda Colarossi 2020 |
From the collection Amica mia nemica by Nel Risi, Mondadori, 1976.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
parallel texts: words reflected 
Dear Matti,
Many different feelings arise in me from this extended sonnet in free verse by Nelo Risi, where emotions and memories at first seem completely to outweigh the structure and devices of the poetry that you have sensitized me to.
My first emotion was to think of a walk on a sunny Mediterranean day, but it quickly became night; I was then reminded by the words […paralume / al lampione, ritagliano foglie… ] of Joseph Brodsky´s stanza from [Любовь] “On Love” when he speaks about getting up at night and going to the window and seeing “fragments of light as phrases, spoken in a dream,” [и фонари в окне/ обрывок фразы сказанной во сне, ] but with him doing this as an adult. And then I read [mi lettino]: “my little bed”, and I am reverted to childhood memories, and my lying in bed at night heaving my chest in torment of asthma, looking at the streetlight through my window screen and imagining my breath was wheezing like the light through this screen. Then next in my reaction to Nelo Risi I reflected on Dylan Thomas’ “A Refusal to Mourn … ” and his phrase […nor blaspheme down the stations of the breath … ].
And yet, there is a lullaby of [-l-]sounds in Risi with the alliteration beginning right from the first line ending in that [lettino], most notably the segment, [paralume / al lampione, ritagliano / foglie sul mio lettino]. Ultimately from our deepest human past we become aware as children of the connected meaning between the light and our lungs, is what Nelo Risi teaches here.
I am so thankful for your work, which arrives like a friendly voice from overseas during this time of doing so much “holding our breath!” God bless you and your family with the eternal enjoyments of Christmas, and a Happy New Year to you, Matti.
Joseph
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