An unexpected attraction - fading voices

He was about to leave when he heard a burst of laughter from a dark corner of the restaurant and then the cling of cutlery.
He recognized the laughter and he smelled his warmth, his smell. A natural perspiration that reached him, unexpected.
It was him.
They were talking in English and he understood. They were talking about travelling.
I love to travel, was saying the little slut. Travelling is the most worthwhile thing you can do.
Is there a special place where you would like to go? Asked his (boy?)-friend.
Everywhere, basically. But above all to Argentina.
Why Argentina?
Actually, not Argentina. I meant Buenos Aires.
Buenos Aires?
Yes.
Why?
I dunno. But I like the big cities. Is by the sea. I adore Spanish y la sangre caliente de la gente de Argentina...
He was surprised that the little slut desired to fly to Buenos Aires. He had the same dream, to fly to Buenos Aires and live there, maybe forever, even though, to be honest, he didn’t like to travel too much. He was convinced that travelling doesn’t really add anything to what you have inside you. It is not enriching, de facto. You don’t need to travel a lot to know how the world goes. Travelling too much can be just another way to dull yourself, to cheat yourself.
Then their voices got lost in the distance and floating around became dim and died.
They had left the restaurant.
He fell silent and listened to their robust laughing, fading away.

Follow me on Substack

 

An unexpected attraction - the Negroni and male...

 

His wife that night had a meeting with old friends. A group of wives that once in a while had a reunion in some locals in Vilnius, that mostly was consistent with drinking and chatting nonsense.

He had tried many times to dissuade her not to go to those meetings, she was unhappy with those women. When she returned home she was every time so disappointed with them...

Why did you go, then? He used to ask her every time.

I had to. They invited me. I couldn't say, NO.

And that's the way it is. No way to change it.

So, he decided to have dinner alone. The sole idea of being home alone was without pleasure. And disquieting.

On the third floor of Panorama, the mall where he went to work every day (at the Ikea space), there was a Mexican restaurant. He had never been there.

Why not? He said. I want to have some takai (tacos).

He realized that that place was for solo diners. Only a couple of couples were there. The atmosphere was dominated by hushed and dim lights, inviting as a waiting room can be, where you feel this is not the place you can belong to for too long of a time because you know that you are only passing through, it's not your final destination.

He sat down and ordered some takai and a Negroni. He decided to cheer up his lonely night with something he loved when he lived in Florence.

While waiting for the takai he started drinking the Negroni. A beautiful girl passed by in front of him, probably returning from the toilette. He couldn't help but watch her ass and think that in Lithuania unfortunately girls rarely have beautiful asses. He meant feminine asses. Most of them have male asses. Little as male asses.

And the word "male ass" triggered something that sent signs of "agitation" (he decided to deny himself the word "arousal"), because he thought of the little slut's ass.

He felt pathetic though. The Negroni made him live in a sort of augmented reality. Unbearable. Also, that diminished place was augmenting the desire he was trying to suffocate in every way.

He couldn't wait to go home and see his wife.

I love you so much. He whispered.

 Follow me on Substack

 

An unexpected attraction - the deep centre of a new wild excitement

He started thinking of his slutty look, his thin dark lips always pulled taut across a smile, that never failed to be in his face.

It was not his idea to begin these thoughts nor his idea to continue them. It was just brewing within, without a due reason. But now that he was in the middle of it he seemed not to have the energy to escape. A fatalism has taken him over. It was a kind of sickness. Let the sickness take its course?
Was he impatient? Did he really want to be intimate with that "exosome"? He marvelled that he used the same word the girl used. Was there any substantial reason to use that same word? Did she intervene to intermediate something? Was she announcing to him it was the time to let down his guard or was she offering herself to him?
He started thinking again of the exosome. He seemed easy and uncomplicated, a little shallow. Passive. And this excited him. He blushed.
He felt disappointed to admit he was excited at the idea of sexual intercourse with him. A bitter disappointment filled him, unhurriedly. it was something leaking through.

He felt that his life gonna have a change, an unexpected change and he was not sure that he wanted that change.

He felt sunk in the deep centre of a new wild excitement he had forgotten, and it progressed mathematically,

Am I insane? What am I doing? He implored himself.

Follow me on Substack

 

Se io potessi

Se io potessi felice vorrei
trascorrere nei giorni con gli occhi 

sereni e pochi al fianco mio - sol quelli 

che amo vorrei e sedere e guardare 

e stare lì e vivere, sospeso

tra l'altro e questo, mondo, che brutto 

si fa, solo se questo vedi e credi - 

non quando sai che  giusto vai

per le vie sue che là portano tutte.

Se io potessi benedirei gli uomini

per il bello che portano ma spesso

come ciechi vivono, e così non

vedono - l'amore mio per loro

non è così grande come di Quello

che creati li ha.

Se io potessi vivere vorrei in preghiera
e di puro spirito mai nutrirmi del cibo immondo.
Solo un caffè chiederei, di quando in quando.

Se io potessi vivere vorrei dove
sempre il sole splende, dove gli alberi
ti aspettano sotto la loro ombra
per riposare e dirti "stai!"

Se io potessi sarei quello che mai
ho potuto essere e dire.
Così sia finalmente, e vivi libero ora.

Amen.

Follow me on Substack

 

Little essay of daily life - what I learned from Pessoa

It has been by chance that I came across Ferdinando Pessoa. The first poem of his I read was in a bad English translation. But I felt an energy coming from the fabric of those words. I researched more, until, later, listening to his poems in the original language, read by a wonderful Portuguese male voice, I discovered the beauty of his poems. Which are often sharp, witty and desecrating and also veiled with melancholy like the poem Há metafísica bastante em não pensar em nada.

Pessoa shows his intimation to remain where the visible ends:

Não acredito em Deus porque nunca o vi.
Se ele quisesse que eu acreditasse nele,
Sem dúvida que viria falar comigo
E entraria pela minha porta dentro
Dizendo-me, Aqui estou!
...

Mas se Deus é as flores e as árvores
E os montes e sol e o luar,
Então acredito nele,
Então acredito nele a toda a hora,
E a minha vida é toda uma oração e uma missa,
E uma comunhão com os olhos e pelos ouvidos.

Mas se Deus é as árvores e as flores
E os montes e o luar e o sol,
Para que lhe chamo eu Deus?
Chamo-lhe flores e árvores e montes e sol e luar;
Porque, se ele se fez, para eu o ver,
Sol e luar e flores e árvores e montes,
Se ele me aparece como sendo árvores e montes
E luar e sol e flores,
É que ele quer que eu o conheça
Como árvores e montes e flores e luar e sol. [1]
 

And when I am forced to face the ugliness of the poor human matter that surrounds me daily, I learned his lesson and I never try to go beyond the little it shows, because

Cada coisa é o que é [2]

It is therefore useless to look beyond what does not exist because it would be a vain effort to persist in it, for in hoc saeculo, in this transient world:

Tudo isso é absolutamente independente da minha vontade [3]

In fact, the problem of being such a poor living thing is theirs, and not mine.

PS. I believe in God. But The lectio magistralis by Pessoa, I find it perfectly applicable to daily life.

----------------

[1] 

I don't believe in God because I never saw him.
If he wanted me to believe in him,
Without a doubt he would come and talk to me
And he would enter through my door within
Telling me, Here I am!
...
But if God is the flowers and the trees
And the mountains and Sun and moonlight,
Then I believe in him,
Then I believe in him at all hours,
And my life is all a prayer and a mass,
And my communion with the eyes and through the ears.

But if God is the trees and the flowers
And the mountains and the moonlight and the Sun,
Then why should I call him God?
I call him flowers and trees and mountains and Sun and moonlight;
Because, if he made himself, for me to see him,
Sun and moonlight and flowers and trees and mountains,
If he appears to me being trees and mountains
And moonlight and Sun and flowers,
It is that he wants me to recognize him
Like trees and mountains and flowers and moonlight and Sun.

[2] 

Each thing is what it is

(Pessoa - A espantosa realidade das coisas)

[2] 

All of this is absolutely independent of my will

(Pessoa - A espantosa realidade das coisas)

Follow me on Substack

 

Piccolo saggio di esistenza quotidiana - la lezione di Pessoa

 

Ho scoperto Pessoa, per caso.
E l'ho scoperto per caso in una traduzione inglese brutta che mi aveva dato l'impressione di un poeta di poco valore.
Ma poi ascoltando i suoi poemi in originale, letti da una meravigliosa voce maschile portoghese, ho scoperto la bellezza dei suoi poemi. Che spesso sono arguti e dissacratori e velati anche di malinconia come il poema Há metafísica bastante em não pensar em nada.
E' ovvio che non sono d'accordo con il suo apparente materialismo, ma perché è un materialismo apparente perché si limita a non volere andare oltre ciò che è visibile, come la siepe di Leopardi, muove e stuzzica il pensiero o a volersi fermare o ad andare oltre appunto. È il pensiero di Pessoa accenna a questo, ma è forse con poca forza, coraggio, o volontà per andare più oltre quel velo che lui così bene descrive.

Não acredito em Deus porque nunca o vi.
Se ele quisesse que eu acreditasse nele,
Sem dúvida que viria falar comigo
E entraria pela minha porta dentro
Dizendo-me, Aqui estou!
...

Mas se Deus é as flores e as árvores
E os montes e sol e o luar,
Então acredito nele,
Então acredito nele a toda a hora,
E a minha vida é toda uma oração e uma missa,
E uma comunhão com os olhos e pelos ouvidos.

Mas se Deus é as árvores e as flores
E os montes e o luar e o sol,
Para que lhe chamo eu Deus?
Chamo-lhe flores e árvores e montes e sol e luar;
Porque, se ele se fez, para eu o ver,
Sol e luar e flores e árvores e montes,
Se ele me aparece como sendo árvores e montes
E luar e sol e flores,
É que ele quer que eu o conheça
Como árvores e montes e flores e luar e sol.

E por isso eu obedeço-lhe,
(Que mais sei eu de Deus que Deus de si próprio?),
Obedeço-lhe a viver, espontaneamente,
Como quem abre os olhos e vê,
E chamo-lhe luar e sol e flores e árvores e montes,
E amo-o sem pensar nele,
E penso-o vendo e ouvindo,
E ando com ele a toda a hora [1]

E la melodia della sua lingua mi concilia con la bruttura umana che mi circonda, e ho imparato la sua lezione quando mi trovo ad affrontare siffatto materiale umano con cui non cerco mai dį andare oltre quel poco che mostra, perché

Cada coisa é o que é [2]

E dunque inutile cercare oltre quello che non esiste e di cui è vano sforzo incaponirsi a parlare e perché ho finalmente capito, che in hoc saeculo, in questo mondo di passaggio,

Tudo isso é absolutamente independente da minha vontade [3]

Il problema è loro appunto, non mio.

---------------------

[1] Non credo in Dio perché non l’ho mai visto.
Se egli volesse che credessi in lui,
verrebbe senza dubbio a parlarmi
e entrerebbe dalla mia porta
dicendomi: Eccomi!
...

Ma se Dio è i fiori e gli alberi
e i monti e il sole e il chiarore lunare,
allora credo in lui,
allora credo in lui ad ogni momento,
e la mia vita è tutta una preghiera e una messa,
e una comunione con gli occhi e attraverso gli orecchi.

Ma se Dio è gli alberi e i fiori
e i monti e la luce della luna e del sole,
perché lo chiamo Dio?
Lo chiamo fiori e alberi e monti e sole e chiar di luna;
perché se egli si è fatto perché io lo vedessi
sole e chiar di luna e fiori e alberi e monti,
se egli mi appare come essendo alberi e monti
e chiar di luna e sole e fiori,
vuol dire che vuole che io lo conosca
come alberi e monti e fiori e chiar di luna e sole.

E per questo io gli obbedisco,
(che altro so io di Dio che non Dio di se stesso?),
gli obbedisco nel vivere, spontaneamente,
come chi apre gli occhi e vede,
e lo chiamo chiar di luna e sole e fiori e alberi e monti,
e lo amo senza pensare a lui,
e lo penso vedendo e sentendo,
e sto con lui a ogni momento.

[2] Ogni cosa è ciò che è 

(Pessoa - A espantosa realidade das coisas)

[3] Tutto questo vive assolutamente indipendente dalla mia volontà

(Pessoa - A espantosa realidade das coisas)

Follow me on Substack

 

 

An unexpected attraction - the intimation of an encounter

Being a writer nowadays, at this point in human history, takes courage. To spend time writing, to think you can earn a living by writing books, takes courage. He used to repeat it to himself every time he received the cancellation of one of his presentations.
Many people, in his shoes, probably would have drunk to forget the disillusion but he didn't drink. He hated drunk people. He could not understand how you can destroy yourself by drinking alcohol. Such an idiocy.
How many times his courage had changed form during the years, during all those years in which he had written books? Many times, he concluded. He remembered his Florentine season when he lived and worked in Florence. Those had been the years of sex. He was haunted and taunted by sex.
Now he had a wife, he loved her, and his desire for wild sex was gone, it had an almost romantic sex with his wife. The beast that used to inhabit him had become like an amputated limb, a vague but achy memory though, suggested rather than felt.
So he got an insane idea of writing a story about this encounter with the little slut. An encounter that didn't have to happen. He came across this idea because he was wondering whether he was really interested in seducing him. Yes, the idea was enticing him. But it was just an idea. He didn't foresee any action on his part.

He imagined spending a night with him. The sole thinking of that possible action, made him nervous. The intimation that he could have an evening in a very close intimacy with him in the darkness of a cinema made him thrill and triggered again the beast within that never died.

The Florentine season that had been lurking for such a long time was now reviving, unannounced.

TO BE CONTINUED (MAYBE)...

Follow me on Substack

 

Piccolo saggio di esistenza quotidiana - la forza del caffè

Capisci che certe volte il disgusto raggiunge un livello isopportabile? E non era una domanda che faceva ad un altro ma che faceva a se stesso. Ma la faceva come se la ponesse ad un altro. Come se quel disgusto appartenesse a qualcuno che lui non era, ma con cui doveva obtorto collo condividere lo stesso spazio.
E in effetti era così, doveva condividere molti spazi, l'io di tante persone, che avrebbe voluto, agitando una bacchetta magica, far sparire e per sempre.
Dividere quegli spazi non lo rendeva libero. Ma schiavo. Gli sottraevano spazio, glielo occupavano e lo facevano schiavo, schiavo di una tristezza che poi sfociava nel dubbio, nell'incertezza e nella difficoltà a reagire. Ma la libertà non è un dono che ti arriva. Libertà e verità corrono parallele e sono selettive. Solo chi le sa cercare e trovare, diviene libero e conosce la verità.
Tutte quelle figure umane con cui doveva condividere lo spazio della sua esistenza dalla mattina alla sera erano lì per quello, per ricordargli: sei nato libero ma noi ti abbiamo fatto schiavo. Ricordalo!
E allora si fermava, e prendeva tempo per pensare. Solo in quel tempo che passava con se stesso, ritrovava i fondamenti della libertà e verità.
Prendeva un caffè. Andava da Ali, al piano terra del centro commerciale di Vilnius, Panorama, e prendeva un caffè. Il caffè lo restaurava. Il caffè era il primo fondamento della libertà. Forse perché non vi era mai stato un dottore, allopata o omeopata non importa, che non gli avesse ingiunto di smettere di prendere il caffè. Ma lui aveva sempre disobbedito e lo aveva preso, anzi aveva aumentato il numero dei caffè che prendeva durante il giorno: era passato da quattro a sette, otto...ormai non li contava più. A lui il caffè faceva bene. Lo rendeva libero. Era un segno di non conformità di non adattamento.
Ecco anche quella volta prese un caffè. La testa era confusa, piena di nebbia prima. Ma poi i pensieri si fecero tersi e poi limpidi. E le direzioni smisero di ingarbugliarsi ma si districarono, divennero lineari, non più contorte. E disse.
Ecco!

Follow me on Substack

 

An unexpected attraction - Sturgeon's Law (fourth part)

His most recent book, Why should I read books if the 99% is shit? had become to his surprise an enormous success. Some Lithuanian publishers that in the past never considered his works started inviting him to lecture to Vilniaus Universitetas students of Literature and to some book presentations in the city.
During these lectures, he was many times asked why he thought that 90% of published books were crap.
In his support, he mentioned Sturgeon's law.
Many of the people he lectured didn't know anything of Sturgeon’s law. So he had to recap it for them. Sturgeon's law is an adage - he used to start - that states that 90% of everything is crap. It was coined by Theodore Sturgeon, an American science fiction author and critic, who was tired of defending his genre from critics who used the worst examples of science fiction as ammunition against him. He realized that most works in other fields were also low-quality, and so science fiction was no different.
He first expressed his law around 1951 at a talk at New York University, and later wrote it in his book review column for Venture magazine in 1957. He also called it Sturgeon’s Revelation, and added some corollaries to explain his point of view.
After repeating this refrain there was always someone who objected that it was a very subjective opinion that 90% of published books are crud.
To these people he objected it's not subjective but it's reality. And whoever thinks it's subjective is because it's part of the 90%. But according to him, 90% was little, but 99% was reality. Whereupon many got up and left.
And obviously, this boutade of his did not please the Lithuanian publishing houses who boycotted him and never invited him again.

TO BE CONTINUED (MAYBE)...

Follow me on Substack

 

An unexpected attraction (Third part)

They are two exosomes. Both gays. One is Iranian, the other, the one you like, is Finnish.
He was disoriented. What she was talking about? How did she know that he liked the Finnish guy?
Actually, I do not understand what you want? And...who are you?
My name is Eiva. I come here to work, like you. I noticed how often you glance at them, above all at him. And she hinted at him with the cup of coffee she was holding in her hand.
They are not nice guys, I tell you, are both pervs.
She seemed jealous. He had that impression. But jealous for what? It was the first time he saw her.
Why did you say they are exosomes? He asked. He was curious about that strange definition.
They are extraneous bodies, they act in a way which is different from the way we usually do here in Lithuania. We are not a multicultural society, we like to hold to what we are and have been. Do you understand?
I think so, he replied. They are scandalous in your eyes.
Yes, they are...are you married? She asked, bluntly.
Yes, I am. Why? Does it count for you?
No, I asked just for curiosity.
Do I look like a married man?
Yes.
He laughed. Yes, I am married and I love my wife.
She's Lithuanian I imagine.
Yes. You imagine well. What about you?
I am single.
Are you looking for a partner?
Not really. I live well, alone. I like observing people, that's my favourite diversion at the moment.
Did you observe me?
Yes.
Why?
I don't know. A sort of energy was coming from you.
He paused. She was saying the same he was thinking in the end. Energy.
But your energy was not directed to me. Was always direct to that Finnish guy.
How do you know them?
I talked to them sometimes. But I don't like them. So, I stopped talking to them.
You made it quite clear.
But if you have a wife, why do you want him?
What make you believe that I want him?
The way you were looking at him. The energy you proved watching him.
And she was now facing him defiantly. But he thought instead, she was "eager".
I...he replied...I (and he was searching for and weighing words)...think they entertain me.
They entertain you?
It's a bore to stay six or eight hours here...so they are my diversion...in the end, I observe as you observe. As you feel pleasure observing, I feel pleasure watching them...I think this is the same for me.
But this said, he felt that that sentence was a too-expected response, sort of a stage direction in a play (now respond vaguely and indefinitely).
They, both, fell silent.
Outside, beyond the big window it was a still lovely day hot and sunny. The summer was already there.

TO BE CONTINUED (MAYBE)...

Follow me on Substack

 

La metafisica del gatto nero

 

Mas que melhor metafísica que a delas,
Que é a de não saber para que vivem
Nem saber que o não sabem?
(Fernando Pessoa) [1]


Che mondo si vedrà

con gli occhi di un gatto

nero che il mondo guarda

che lui sempre disprezza e

teme? Che male fatto

ha, a quel mondo lontano?

Unico torto: nero è.

E passa fra gli uomini

i giorni suoi ignaro.

Forse che mai una volta

pensò: ma che vuoi tu

che le palle ti tocchi e

menagramo balocchi

il pisello pari al tuo

cervello? Non capisce

infima però il gatto

la sua nera natura

lo condanna in eterno

per paura - e a suo scherno.

---------------
[1] Ma quale metafisica meglio della loro,
che è quella di non sapere perché vivono
né sapere che non lo sanno?

Follow me on Substack

 

Io veglierò la notte

 

Io veglierò la notte e se la pioggia

cadrà ne ascolterò il suono metallico

e la mattina saluterò di corvi

il canto che da neri rami - al sole

si benedicono di luce nuova

che si allontana dai colpi del gelo.

Io veglierò la notte e aspetterò la

chiamata di quest'altra primavera.

Follow me on Substack

 

La volata

Quando muoio, che sarà? chi testimonierà me?
Chi terrà la memoria della mia venuta e dipartita?
Chi vedrà ancora i segni lasciati dietro - di ciò che ero
pensavo, amavo, soffrivo e gioivo?

Ero uno sciocco? O ero un esempio per chi in me credeva?
Non amavo troppo ciò che ero, ma mi accettavo, e mi chiamavo
e nel mio nome risuonavo e rinfrancavo.
Ero io, ero quello che ero divenuto, giorno dopo giorno.

E questo è tutto. Ero io. Solo io. 

Non mi amavo forse - ma nemmeno mi odiavo.
Ma ora che mi appresso, che vedo il traguardo

una lunga dirittura ma ancora lenta è la volata.

Non c'è vincitore, perché l'unico

che corre sono io. Solo io.
E non anelo alla vittoria ma nemmeno mi sottraggo.
E' una corsa lunga, una tappa che pareva senza fine.

Ma ora sono in testa, tiro la volata e 

sono l'unico in gruppo, senza squadra.

Follow me on Substack

 

Nulla io sono, nulla

Nulla io sono, nulla

Nulla che io vorrei, nulla

Ma a parte questo - io tengo tutti

i sogni che volevo.

Follow me on Substack

 

Piccolo saggio di esistenza quotidiana - la logica opposta

Un giorno strano. Un giorno in cui la mente muore. Vive lontana. in cui provo ma è solo fatica. E tanta.
Io ho un centro: lo stomaco. Un orrore.
Qualcosa volta penso che vi sia un mostro che abita lì dentro, perché lì è tutto il mio tormento, il mio male, tutti i miei mali partono da quel punto.
E' incurabile. Per quanto lo curi faccio due passi avanti e tre indietro.
E allora penso. E forse il mio male è anche il mio bene. Perché penso e capisco, e alla fine la croce ha questo, che ti fa pensare. E per esso pochi accettano la croce.
Ma la croce migliora e perfeziona l'uomo e lo fa attraverso l'inquietudine, il dolore, la sofferenza.
Per questo si dice che bisogna accettare la croce. La croce è in ultimo il simbolo dell'uomo che cerca la verità. Cercare la verità è ricerca, sofferenza e dolore, olreché inquietudine.
Chi cerca la verità è uno che non accetta il mondo come gli viene proposto, ma lo scandaglia, lo seleziona, lo analizza a prezzo del dolore. Lo rivolta sottosopra, invertendo la logica corrente.
Per questo alla fine io sono grato al mostro che sta nelle mie viscere, perché senza di quello non cercherei la riflessione, il pensiero, l'analisi, e, probabilmente, mi stordirei correndo dietro alle narrazioni del mondo.
Uno che aveva capito la logica di questa croce come nessun altro credo (nemmeno sant'Agostino ha afferrato così perfettamente quella logica) è stato San Paolo (Corinzi 1, 27-28):

[...]τὰ μωρὰ τοῦ κόσμου ἐξελέξατο ὁ θεός, ἵνα καταισχύνῃ τοὺς σοφούς, καὶ τὰ ἀσθενῆ τοῦ κόσμου ἐξελέξατο ὁ θεός, ἵνα καταισχύνῃ τὰ ἰσχυρά, καὶ τὰ ἀγενῆ τοῦ κόσμου καὶ τὰ ἐξουθενημένα ἐξελέξατο ὁ θεός, τὰ μὴ ὄντα, ἵνα τὰ ὄντα καταργήσῃ [...]
"quello che è stolto per il mondo, Dio lo ha scelto per confondere i sapienti; quello che è debole per il mondo, Dio lo ha scelto per confondere i forti; quello che è ignobile e disprezzato per il mondo, quello che è nulla, Dio lo ha scelto per ridurre al nulla le cose che sono"

In Dio il mondo, quello in cui viviamo, e che Sant'Agostino chiama il saeculum, è capovolto; e il dolore e la sofferenza ci inquietano e accendono il nostro motore perché andiamo oltre quel dolore e quella sofferenza, perché andiamo oltre la logica del saeculum, che San Paolo così bene spiega, in direzione della logica opposta a quella mondana.

Follow me on Substack

 

An unexpected attraction (Second part)

After a while, he saw his "boyfriend" arriving and kissing him on the left cheek. Then they started talking animatedly. And he was jealous. He felt the grip of jealousy.

How stupid I am. Fuck off! I have a wife home, I love her so much, why I ended up in this hell of thoughts?

He stood up from the seat he had finally found and went to the coffee machine, selected Espresso and paid with the credit card. He waited for the usual voice coming from the machine "Palaukite, prašau, patvirtinimo". Then it started pouring the coffee and filling the cup. 

Am I crazy? he asked himself. Am I schizo? He reinforced the question, He couldn't find an answer.

He got the cup of coffee, leaned against the wall close to the coffee machine and started sipping the coffee and thinking,

What am I doing? I should not come here any longer. He said whispering to himself. Did I lie to myself all my life? I am 58, I've never thought of a male as a possible object of desire. I made love only to women. I have been interested all my life in women and now...like a jab to my face...I want...fuck!

He glanced at the couple and saw his partner squeezing the arm of the little slut in an almost violent way.

He had the feeling of breathing the smell of the little slut's flesh. It was like a needle entering his pubic region. Excruciating.

Is the coffee good? It was a voice. A close voice.

He watched her. He recognized a girl that almost every day was sitting there working. She had a blunt look. She was in front of him and watched him.

TO BE CONTINUED (MAYBE)...

Follow me on Substack

 

La fatica del vivere e la sindrome del "dì di festa"

E fieramente mi si stringe il core,
A pensar come tutto al mondo passa,
E quasi orma non lascia. Ecco è fuggito
Il dì festivo, ed al festivo il giorno
Volgar succede, e se ne porta il tempo
Ogni umano accidente...
Tutto è pace e silenzio, e tutto posa

il mondo...

La fatica di vivere è tutta riassunta qui, nei versi di Leopardi. Quel "male" che ci coglie soprattutto alla fine del fine settimana. Che coglie soprattutto i popoli ricchi, pingui e viziati da una vita dove si ha tempo per concedersi una pausa lunga al succedersi dei giorni volgari. Dove l'uomo ha tempo per confrontarsi con il suo pensiero; e questo spaura, perché in quella pausa l'uomo ha sé, per confrontarsi con sé, con il senso della sua vita, per cui allora

profondissima quïete
io nel pensier mi fingo, ove per poco
il cor non si spaura

La domenica non è altro che quella siepe, quella barriera che separa il vero io dall'io che deve fingere di non vedere la barriera

questa siepe, che da tanta parte
dell’ultimo orizzonte il guardo esclude

Che per tutta la settimana finge di non vedere, non ha tempo di vedere o rifiuta di vedere. Perché pensare aumenta il dolore. E molti scelgono di non pensare e scelgono una falsa vita onodina, ignava, una vita né calda né fredda. Insipida. E vivono bene nell'insipido e pretendono di essere felici in quello stato.

La fatica della vita ha la forma di una croce, e bene ricordarlo, di un punto in cui si intersecano la scelta del dolore e la negazione del dolore.

Ma molti, i più, rinnegano la croce e il conseguente dolore

e più di lor non si ragiona.

An unexpected attraction (First part)

He remembered, that it was energy. He had no other words to mean it.

He was sitting but he felt like a strong energy coming from him and reaching him. He felt his eyes on him. Almost felt them burning his back. He truly sensed it.
It was annoying. Why is he interested in me?
They didn't look at each other. They pretended, both, not to look at each other.
In the end, he was disappointed when he was not there. When he arrived at that place and he didn't find him sitting at his usual seat in front of his computer he felt he was missing a part of his day. What he was doing he had no idea. But slowly, day after day he had become curious about what he was doing, what he was working on. A couple of times, he had been able to peek at the screen of his computer. Maybe he was working with Photoshop.
He always sat partnered with another guy. His boyfriend? He thought so, because sometimes they were joking and laughing very close. He probably was the female in the couple, because he had the look of a cunning slut. A scandalous look of a mischievous and scandalous slut.
Those days it was becoming hot and he was wearing a white cotton vest leaving his shoulders bare as a young slut.
That dragged him more to him, to desire that young slut.
That slut look-like amped up his prowess for that energy flowing between him and him.

He looked past him. In the opposite direction of him. Through the enormous windows facing the city, its roofs, the crossroads, the green trees...
Yes, it is energy. I have no other explanation. He thought.
They never spoke a word but he could almost sense it in the air the desire to talk and touch each other, and this surprised him.
That day he had foolishly thought that the Ikea space was empty, with a few people. It was Friday afternoon, 2 am.
The only seat free instead was in front of him. He hesitated. Then he decided not to sit there. He was surprised. He was a straight guy. How come he was attracted by another male?
He didn't find any reason. The only reason, he thought, to be taken into consideration, was the energy. That strong and inescapable energy had taken him off-guard.
But he resisted. He didn't give up.

TO BE CONTINUED (MAYBE)...

Follow me on Substack

 

 

Why so many men are evil and are pleased to rule the other men as slave and subject - as we see in the Evil which dominates globalism?

Folly is inhabiting man as well as the divine. They compensate each other but they struggle and fight at the same time. This is what is bringing about the human drama of homo interior.

Dostoevsky is the author who best depicts madness in man, which suffocates the vitalism of homo interior (where the equipoise between madness and divine is perfectly working) to such a point that puts him in a cramped corner of his soul, the underground, where folly is taking the upper hand in man.
In the incipit of Notes from the Underground, the main character describes his folly as, initially, an illness which then transforms into pleasure for illness and finally he savours it as a sweet and rewarding pleasure of his folly.

"I am a sick man…. I am an angry man. I am an unattractive man. I think there is something wrong with my liver. But I don’t understand the least thing about my illness, and I don’t know for certain what part of me is affected. I am not having any treatment for it, and never have had, although I have a great respect for medicine and for doctors. I am besides extremely superstitious, if only in having such respect for medicine. (I am well educated enough not to be superstitious, but superstitious I am.) No, I refuse treatment out of spite. That is something you will probably not understand. Well, I understand it. I can’t of course explain who my spite is directed against in this matter; I know perfectly well that I  can’t ‘score off’ the doctors in any way by not consulting them; I know better than anybody that I am harming nobody but myself. All the same, if I don’t have treatment, it is out of spite. Is my liver out of order? – let it get worse!

I have been living like this for a long time now – about twenty years. I am forty. I once used to work in the government service but I don’t now. I was a bad civil servant. I was rude, and I enjoyed being rude. After all, I didn’t take bribes, so I had to have some compensation. (A poor witticism; but I won’t cross it out. When I wrote it down, I thought it would seem very pointed: now, when I see that I was simply trying to be clever and cynical, I shall leave it in on purpose.) When people used to come to the desk where I sat, asking for information, I snarled at them, and was hugely delighted when I succeeded in hurting somebody’s feelings."

And it is in this acceptance of being mad and rejoicing in their own madness that people gain a new status where they believe that everything is possible. Because they cancelled the homo interior, they suppressed the divine and chose the route of delirium where the folly of believing in a man harnessed by his own power (intelligence, blood skin and bones) is the only logically consequential reason that drives him to his destruction.
For the same reason, the oligarchs who rule the world are not so far from the conclusions of Dostoevsky's Man of the Underground: "The main point, and the supreme nastiness, lay in the fact that even at my moments of greatest spleen, I was constantly and shamefully aware that not only was I not seething with fury, I was not even angry; I was simply scaring sparrows for my own amusement."

And when you get to this point there is nothing that has a logical ground, everything is done just for your own madness.

And what we are living in now is, in fact, a world where folly has reached its highest pitch in human history.

Follow me on Substack

 

Con gli occhi guardare - Poesie 2020 - 2023

 

Pubblico dopo molti anni, tanti anni, una raccolta di poesie. La poesia era morta in me. E' rinata nei mesi dell'orrore, quelli in cui abbiamo dovuto subire ogni sorta di angheria in nome di una grande falsità. I primi testi di questa raccolta rispecchiano quelle atmosfere, per poi allargarsi a meditazioni vissute post orrore. In cui l'animo prova di nuovo a respirare a cercare le memorie la bellezza e l'amore.

Si può leggere in Academia: 

https://www.academia.edu/101479870/Con_gli_occhi_guardare_Poesie_2020_2023

Follow me on Substack

 

Viene di lontano il sole

 

Viene di lontano il sole che lungo la strada brilla. E' freddo. Ma il sole brilla. Cammino lungo il viale che da casa porta verso il supermercato. E' una luce morbida e ha un suo odore questa strada sotto gli alberi. E il vento che porta il sole che brilla viene di lontano. Viene forse dal mare del nord. Dalla Finlandia.

Ha il sapore del mare del Nord. Ha l'odore antico di una terra marina dove perdersi è facile. Porta grandi spazi in cui perdersi. E ogni giorno che cammino per queste strade mi perdo nel vento, i miei elettroni si staccano e mi abbandonano, e mi allontano dal centro, che muore sempre più distante.

E il sole dopo lunghi mesi di cielo nero mi brilla dentro e dentro brilla il sole al cielo finalmente azzurro.

È come rinascere, mi dico, e lo sento. Rinascere alla vita tramite nuovi sensi. I sensi della primavera.

E viene la primavera lungo le strade di Vilnius e si annuncia alla gente che ancora frettolosa, quasi temesse sempre il gelo, comincia a sperare e alla nuova luce crede.

Follow me on Substack

 

Verrò da te

Verrò da te Claudina, mi porterà 

Il vento del nord. 

Verrò lungo i viali  del nulla

Lungo corridoi di luce.

Seguirò la strada delle foglie 

E del respiro degli Alberi.

E ti vedrò,  dolce lo sguardo

Il tocco morbido della tua mano

Sarà il saluto di un padre a sua figlia

Piangerò lacrime ma felice 

Quel pianto come benedizione

scenderà e in silenzio parlerà 

Di una notte eterna e senza fine.

Follow me on Substack

 

 

Octavio Paz: sobre el amor y la mirada

El amor es una palabra llena de significado diversos y contradictorio. Al mismo tiempo es universal. Todos lo hombres la usamos. Y para cada hombre tiene un significado particular, una imagin individual. Y, sin embargo, como la luna que es distinta en todos lados es la misma luna, tambien el amor, en cierto modo, es el mismo en todos lados.

Sus ojos:
el pacto del sol de verano con el sol de otoño.
Nuestros cuerpos
se hablaron, se juntaron y se fueron.
Nosotros nos fuimos con ellos.

Sí, tenían razón los poetas provenzales, los poetas de la edad media y los del renacimiento, y los de la edad barroca, y los modernos cuando dicen que el amor comienza con los ojos y cuando dicen, también, que el amor, que los ojos despiden, arrojan flechas, Se dice todavía, el flechazo. Sí, el amore comienza cuando dos personas se miran una a la otra. Yo no so se el amore sea conocimiento como pensaba Platón, pero sí, creo que el amor es reconocimiento. Reconocemos en la persona que queremos una imagen muy antigua que teníamos grabada en los repliegues de nuestro ser. Y también, y esto lo más importante, quizá, o igualmente importante, nos sentimos reconocidos. Sentimos que alguien nos reconoce, que alguien nos ve de verdad.

Follow me on Substack

 

Se io mi guardo intorno

 

 ...tenían razón los poetas provenzales , los poetas de la edad media y los del renacimiento, y los de la edad barroca, y los modernos cuando dicen que el amor comienza con los ojos...

(Octavio Paz)

Se io mi guardo intorno, non ho dubbi

che chi ha creato noi, sia solo amore.
Se guardo i corpi, i volti le mani
i piedi e gambe, le pancie e le occhiaie 

le mammelle cadenti, e le rughe 

nei vecchi, quelli che soffrono soli

e piangono e quelli che felici

ridono, e i belli e i brutti, 

i giovani immortali - non è dubbio 

che il creatore sia fatto di solo 

amore - non vi è dubbio il creato 

inizi dall'amore che è beato.

Quanto brutto è l' uomo che cattivo,
il male interiore lo trasforma 

nelle sue parti, tutto esteriore

appare il livore , che deforma 

l'essere - non ho dubbio e lo penso 

davvero allora - che chi ha creato noi, 

sia solo amore - e di silenzio

dignità di chi sente, vive e vede

capisce questo amore che negli occhi 

tien i segni la soglia oltre quale 

stanno certi i sogni.

Follow me on Substack

 

Poetry, Beauty and God's breathing

 

In this poem, Bukowski is an excellent example of what I am saying, that poetry says to the poet by naming things where you have to go and where you have to go is the threshold of Beauty, which is the point where you are transcending this life (saeculum) and you hear the breath of God on you.

And poet can be everyone, who is looking for Beauty and lives and experiences Beauty in life, without writing it on paper.


your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvellous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

(The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski)

Follow me on Substack