Journal of Italian Translation

Adria Bernardi/Raffaello Baldini
because Alessandri, I can’t say enough good things about him,
but his words, when he came out, he said:
“This is a miracle, if it had been
three minutes later,” and I started crying, right there, and laughing,
if it hadn’t burst, but I understood a lot after those things,
that this mortal life, when it’s all said and done, nothing’s ever
enough,
and we, whatever it is we believe in,
all our ambitions, for what?
we are holding on by a thread.
because in the hospital I saw Nandi, I didn’t recognize him,
he’d gone down to have X-rays taken, we talked and then
saying goodbye he squeezed my hand,
without looking at me: “But fifty’s
a little early,” and he went away with the nurse,
I didn’t know how to answer him, and then during the night,
those words, I thought about them,
because he, yeah, a real wheeler-dealer, true, but everyone
likes money, let’s be honest, plus with deals,
if you don’t do it someone else will,
he’d bought out Cecchi months ago,
and now even Armanda, alone,
a woman, we were talking the other day
about Paolino Campidelli, he goes strictly by the books,
and he ends up in that living hell, in that case instead,
but this is not the time, with that boy,
who he bragged about, think about that, then, try to understand,
it’s that they have too much, but it’s not all their fault either,
his mother, all he had to do was ask her,
and his head, or was it someone he associated with,
one year? it must be two by now,
and he doesn’t write, nothing,
they don’t hear a single thing,
it’s as if he’s dead,
and I know him well, Paolino, when I needed some help,
he always worked hard, he never screwed
anyone, why then is he castigated
in this way? I don’t know, but even yesterday evening,
that girl, who I’d passed
just five minutes before,
they went right up on the sidewalk, killed instantly,
what wrong could she have done?
I know, they’re questions,
but I see certain things,
which is a sin, I know, but if there is a God,
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