Renzo Novatore

Twilight Dance

This is the hour of my nocturnal thoughts.
My Demon sleeps.
Sleeps in the dark twilight.
of this soul of mine
The red Demon
of my infernal joy.
I Smoke...
I Smoke desperately,
intensely. Always!
Always! Always! Always!
I wished to think, to write, to sing...
But my Demon sleeps.
Sleeps in the dark twilight
of this soul of mine
The red Demon
of my infernal joy.
And the thoughts do not come...
Not even the laughter and the malediction!
And this is my black hour
Of black melancholy

* * *

I watch, distractedly, my cigarette.
Slender, pallid and warm
Like a sick lover.
I watch it being consumed very slowly
like my life and my dreams:
like the life and the dreams of all my brothers.
The ash fell to earth and dispersed. So!
The smoke, it raises, dense and gray, in the air
and is dispersed also. So.
For me naught remains
but a bit of yellow nicotine on the loving lips. So.

* * *

My Demon sleeps.
Sleeps in the dark twilight
of this soul of mine
The red Demon
of my infernal joy.
I watch the Sun!
I see it descend between the blond whirlpool
of a beautiful sea of gold.
Of gold and of blood...
But my heart is bitten.
Bitten by a frigid plant
without hopes and tears,
without hatred and without love.
Oh, you could at least cry...
you could at least curse...
But, no!
No! no! no!

* * *

Who?
Who ever therefore has made me so bad?
Who is the evil craftsman
of this my suffering?
Oh mother... my mother...
If still you had the force
of being able at least to curse...
But, no!
No! No! No!
Nevertheless it was you only
you! Who
have given me life,
Who have given me pain,
Who have given me Evil!
But tell me:
You believed perhaps in the joy of living?
I am therefore the son of such a grotesque dream?
Or am I just a most vulgar son
of the collective unconsciousness?
But why then, oh mother,
didn’t you have
- that day -
the heroic inspiration to strike
VIOLENTLY
your swollen stomach
over a hard stone. So!
Because I wouldn’t have willed to see
The Sun.
Because I wouldn’t have willed
This miserable life.
Because I suffer such, So...
O mother, you cry?
And why?
You feel perhaps the remorse
of having created me?
Imagine perhaps the evil
that torments me and breaks me
so terribly?
Oh, you had at least the force
Of being able to to curse...
But, no!
No! No! No!
They are too vile!

* * *

The river flows and sings...
(the beautiful river tranquil and laughing)
Flows over its fine bed
Of wet dust
and its white foams
are a golden quilt.
The titanic reef
washes its granitic flanks
within your terse waters
- o solitary river -
and seated at your banks
I
watch the green leaves
which, embroidered of shadow and of light,
the wind caresses. So!
I watch. Think and remember...
But my soul is dark
and, all around me,
the evening cries. Black.
I love no more.
I no longer believe!

* * *

Who?
Who ever therefore has made me so bad?
The women and Love?
The men and friendship?
The society and its law?
The humanity and its faith?
Perhaps them all!
Perhaps none of them!
I don’t know...
I feel so bad...
So Much! So Much! So Much!
Here... in the soul!

* * *

My Demon sleeps.
sleeps in the dark twilight
of this soul of mine
How much is sad... Sad and melancholy.

* * *

I wish for new friends.
For true new friends.
I need to confide
(to someone)
my black melancholies.
But I do not have friends
I am alone!
Alone with my
MELANCHOLIES
Alone with my Destiny.
Alone, So alone!

* * *

My Demon sleeps.
My brain is shot through
by a Memory.
Memory of a dream.
Dream of youth:
“Men strong and happy,
embrace you, you entwine
with nude bodies of women
beautiful, joyous and happy,
you are celebrated and glorified
by children innocent and happy.
Then:
Flowers and sun.
Music and dances.
Stars and poetry.
Songs and love”.

* * *

My Demon sleeps.
My brain is shot through
By the rays yellowish
black and greenish
of the filthy reality!
Of the reality that passes...
“a blend of brutes and of brutal.
A compound of hypocrisy and ignorance.
A mixture of cowardice and lies.
A totality of dung and mud”.
Ah, no!
No! No! No!
I suffer such!
So Much! So Much! So Much!

* * *

The sun is setting.
(the beautiful sun of gold)
the Angels of the evening
are agonizing...
The green leaves are skulls of the dead,
cold, laughing scornfully...
The river
(the beautiful terse river)
is now a black serpent
frightfully distended between the masses of the reef.
Tomb gloomy and mute.
Tomb gloomy and black.

* * *

My cigarette is extinguished...
(my cigarette pallid and warm
like a sick lover)
The ash is dispersed.
The smoke as well.
To me naught remains but a bit
of yellow nicotine
on the loving lips:
Like of the life and of the dreams. So!

* * *

Within the dark twilight
Of my soul
My red Demon arouses itself.
I feel like a rivulet of bitter blood
flowing over loving lips...
I have a tragic premonition...
What will happen in the night?
But... the stars
the
dear stars they
will see
Oh, if you could again once more
only laugh and curse...
But I see a sinister flash (a pyre?)
Shining in the darkness of the night.
I must STRIKE!
I feel...
I feel! I feel! I feel!
I am a star who turns
towards a tragic sunset.


Symphonic prelude to “DYNAMITE”, By Renzo Novatore (Abele Ferrari), date of composition unknown). Translated by Luther Blissett 2009. Renzo Novatore writes about the sadness and alienation of everyday life in this poem touching on themes of love turned sour and the cruelty of being born into a hostile and oppressive world.