There's a section of this book of translations
from the Italian of the poet named Dino Campana, who
I think is a fabulous poet.
There's only one book in English that I've ever seen,
I've seen scattered poems in anthologies.
So I made some of my own translations.
Although I can't honestly call them
translations because I don't speak a word of Italian.
What I did was, over the years, and I was working on these,
I would get anybody I knew--
colleagues, students, people, and literally
people in pizza parlors, anybody who knew Italian.
Truth.
And I'd get them to do literal prose translations for me.
And then I made my own versions.
And I'll read one of them.
It's called "Song of Darkness."
He died in 1932 or six, or something like that.
These poems are written in the teens, about 1914, '15.
He spent the last 16 years of his life in a madhouse.
"Song of Darkness."
"The hues near dark grow slim.
Nervous spirits, I hope the dark is sweet to the heart that
stopped loving.
We must listen to the beginnings of rivers, rivers,
rivers that understand spirits, spirits that listen.
Listen, the hues near dark grow thin,
and to the nervous spirits the dark is sweet.
Listen, fate has beaten you, for the lighthearted another life
knocks at the door.
No more, more, more.
Is there a tenderness to offset death?
Know who still hugs you.
No, the sweet woman who whispers, no more, more.
Here the wind lifts, and is gone.
Here returns from the ocean and here we
listen to the breathless heart that loved us more.
Let's look-- the trees and water are already like night.
The river moves in its speechless way.
Bang!
Mother, that man up there."
Now he's talking about there.