poetry diary
Mu
Two messy eyebrows
one little childhood scar.
The skyline on the sand
and four drops of green tea.
So one writes blank.
A monk asked Yün-men, the patriarch: – What is the last truth of Buddhism?
Yün-men answered: – I can’t tell you the truth without lying.
Now that you listened to the patriarch
tell me if he lied or not.
If you affirm it, you’ll betray the patriarch
if you deny it, you’ll ignore his lesson.
Then tell me: did he lie or not?
Originally posted in Italian on February 15, 2008 at 22:56
Alfio Farbo
I'm 30 years old and walk along the way of poetry. Poetry is neither my pastime nor my hobby and I don't give one single minute of my free time to it: I don't dabble in poetry. Poetry is a matter of life and death.
I live in different cities at the same time. Until now I was divided between Palermo - where I've grown up - and Heidelberg - where I first met my self. While at the moment I pretend to live in Vienna, there's something I left in Berlin, something that I should get back or drop, someday.
This blog is an English adaptation of the original Italian blog «vuoto su carta». All the translations were made by me personally, so that you have one single responsible person for this all. Translating my poems is an interesting work, it’s practically a rewriting, especially for those pieces which are almost exclusively centred on rhythm, sound and word games. Some poems are extremely simple and almost natural for me to translate, but some others are a little complicated for my English (I’d like to think for everyone’s) and so be patient if some verses sound a little bit strange or even grammatically not correct. Sometimes such strange translations reach however interesting results, but although this, I’m still open to every kind of suggestion you could have, and very thankful too.
In English the title sounds like For whom the lights stay on. The book is in Italian and if you are interested you can order a copy for just 2,5 € on the website of il primitivo editore or directly emailing him here (though his being primitive, he speaks English fluently!)
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