I NEVER FORGET TO CALL YOU LOVE

I NEVER FORGET TO CALL YOU LOVE

Non mi dimentico mai di chiamarti amore (I never forget to call you love) is the sylloge published by Parallelo45 for which I surely “won’t forget” to thank Carmelo Cossa and Manuale di Mari

February has arrived, the month of Valentine’s Day, the most famous romantic occasion, just as romantic is the author’s soul.

Carmelo Cossa is immediately striking in the way he declares his love: love for poetry.

So Poetry becomes the way for expressing the idealisation of love as a totally harmonising expression of feeling.

The author is like a knight of the dolce stil novo, even though life has taken him far from his roots.

Reading the poems in Non dimentico mai di chiamarti amore (I never forget to call you love) I had a strong sense of how the journey from his homeland to the place that would offer him fulfilment was a key element for Carmelo.

Among my favourite poems:

Con il cuore appeso (With the Hanging Heart) because I found myself in the concept of a night grip and also in the comparison of a shredded cloth stretched out in the sun.

Natura e vita (Nature and Life) because I found the personification of nature in the first person a metaphor capable of giving a powerful sense of flow, vitality and harmony.

Magia di vita (Magic of life) for the concept of the ‘beginning again’ of the cycle of the seasons that repeat, but even more so, relive.

Speaking of his Poetry, Carmelo Cossa also quotes Rita Levi Montalcini:

it is better to add life to days than days to life

thus capturing the mark of what I would dare to call a life mission for him: he lives for poetry and makes poetry alive.

So I invite you to pause on Non mi dimentico mai di chiamarti amore (I never forget to call you love) and to think about to which ‘love’ your life is dedicated.

aTUTTOCUORE

aTUTTOCUORE

aTUTTOCUORE with all my heart I would like to thank my brother and sister-in-law because after Twelve Notes again this year my birthday present was a wonderful experience.

A musical experience but also a visual and sensorial one, because at every concert Claudio Baglioni manages to amaze with different versions while remaining true to himself.

After the debut in Pesaro, the indoor version of aTUTTOCUORE started at the Mediolanum Forum in MILAN on 20, 21 and 22 January and will continue on 5 and 6 February.

A show that you shouldn’t miss.

aTUTTOCUORE opens with E tu come stai? And it is just as if Claudio wanted to pick up the thread of the conversation with his fans: like a long public dialogue but at the same time intimate because of the way he gives himself.

This is followed by Dagli il via… and of course ‘the start’ is only the beginning of a long sequence of surprises.

Then Acqua dalla luna … hurry audience … you will see …

you will see the wonder created by the perfect combination of costumes by and choreography by Veronica Peparini directed by Giuliano Peparini.

I will continue with the set list:
Con tutto l’amore che posso and Quante volte featured by Claudio Baglioni’s funny dance moves and by the powerful peculiarity of this show: the images on the maxi-screens blending with the play of light and the evolutions of all the artists up and down the stairs of the stage set create an enthralling three-dimensionality

Then Un po di piu’
Gli anni più belli
Domani mai
Quanto ti voglio
Fammi andar via
Niente più
E adesso la pubblicità
A tutto cuore.

Claudio puts his heart into everything, in the sense of energy, in the sense of wanting to make music at its best, using his heart which, as he said in an interview, can also be considered a percussion instrument, as well as the calendar that marks our time.

And more: Mal d’amore
W l’Inghilterra
Sono io
Cuore D’Aliante
Uomo di varie età
Le ragazze dell’est
Uomini persi
Noi no
Amori in corso
Un nuovo giorno un giorno nuovo
Con voi

and with us Claudio sang illuminating the audience with multidirectional and totally inclusive beams of light.

Unmissable Questo piccolo grande amore
Dodici note
Io sono qui
Amore bello
Solo
Sabato pomeriggio
Porta portese
in a current version enriched with a riot of cheerful playfulness.

Avrai
Io me ne andrei
That masterpiece of Mille giorni di me e di te
My favourite for ‘the hair-raising coffee Via

E tu
Strada facendo
La vita è adesso
and concluding with the music of Poster.

At that point, instead of going far away, you just want to stay so as not to interrupt the magic, but on the screen the faces of the countless musicians, choristers, dancers, artists and performers scroll by.

One above all is the dancer Antonio Ciarciello, chosen after an epic casting, given the number of candidates, who all the time dances as a sort of alter ego.

What do you say? The set list is quite long, yet there are always a few songs missing from the poems in music that Claudio has written.

As many as there are songs, as many are the jackets that Claudio Baglioni has worn: a different one for each song, without ever a moment’s interruption, in a constant succession.

Also incessant is the kaleidoscope of images, futuristic and current, as well as evocative and suggestive by light designer Ivan Pierri

Paolo Gianolio, who has collaborated uninterruptedly with Claudio Baglioni since the 1985 album La vita è adesso.

Many years have passed since then, and yet … La vita è adesso: life is now … is it?

Which is your favourite?

HOW EXCITING THE MEN WHO BREAK OUR HEARTS

HOW EXCITING THE MEN WHO BREAK OUR HEARTS

How exciting are the men who break our hearts is the book written by Dianella Bardelli, whom I thank very much.

The first contact I had with Dianella was vocal, I listened to her voice, which struck me even before discovering the main aspect of the book, and even before realizing what I was going to discover as I read: a feature in common between Dianella and Lenore, I think.

Lenore Kandel.

Dianella Bardelli in her book published by Compagnia Editoriale Aliberti writes in a style that is as personal, immersive as it is biographical.

Lenore Kandel is a poet belonging to the Hippie culture. Actually, often the Hippy  movement is called a “counterculture,” but I don’t like to think in those terms.

Lenore in particular stood out for the intensity with which she lived and spread the very essence of her passion.

Passion that finds its most emblematic representation in The Love Book: a text deemed obscene, seized and banned to such an extent that three clerks were brought to trial on charges of dissemination through their bookstores.

San Francisco, 1967.

A year that began with the Human Be-In at Golden Gate Park prelude to the summer remembered by all as the Summer of love.

An era that I had never fully explored until now but Lenore and Dianella showed me in all its philosophy.

Lenore and Dianella, two women, distant in space, time, and color, but close in writing as an expression of their intense passion.

Dianella’s face is framed by golden hair.

Lenore’s face is highlighted by the famous black braids.

Dianella writes novels and poems, and in addition to How Exciting the Men Who Break Our Hearts, she published Near but Far, Altruistic Fish are Reborn Children, Neal’s Psychedelic Bard, Toward Katmandu in Search of Happiness, I’m Going for a Look, 1968.

Lenore, beyond the aforementioned The Love Book left us, among other works, Word Alchemy … a title that I find poetic in itself.

Dianella’s destiny led her to discover Lenore by chance and to be the only woman to tell us about her in Italy.

Lenore’s destiny led her to be on stage at the Human Be-In on January 14, 1967, the only woman to speak, on her thirty-fifth birthday.

You can see her here after the greetings from minute 11:30.

Dianella writes on three blogs:

Spontaneous Poetry 

A writing blog 

A haiku blog 

in addition to countless web collaborations.

Lenore left us this conversation with Carlos Fresneda, in which she also quotes Lawrence Ferlinghetti while you can have a view through Isaac Hernandez’s photos.

Basically, How Exciting the Men Who Break Our Hearts to me spoke about Women, and, in my own personal reading key, I found myself thinking about how our lives breaks us.

Without adding more I leave you with this sentence from the book:
What is not sufficiently illuminated by the light of wisdom fails to move from idealization to concrete realization.

FAME D’ARIA – HUNGER FOR AIR

FAME D’ARIA – HUNGER FOR AIR

Fame d’aria – Hunger for air is the latest book by Daniele Mencarelli published by Mondadori.

Daniele Mencarelli has needed no introduction for a while now.

Fame d’aria – Hunger for air appealed to me because of the structure, the writing and the way in which in real time the reader gets the full load of the eighteen years of life with Jacopo.

Jacopo is not the main character; Jacopo is Peter’s son, Pete is a man.

I say just a man because that is what I thought as I got to know him one line after another.

Pete is not a superhero, he is not a champion, he is not even an example. Peter is simply a person, a human being, as are all those who try to behave in the right way against the waves of the storm that is life: an incessant and continuous lashing that hits inexorably.

Also for this reading I thank Monica, and then I also say thank you to Luciana for pointing me to the meeting with the writer organized by The Pleasure of Telling

In this way I was able to listen directly to Daniele Mencarelli’s words and find out how his need to tell this story came about.

About six years ago he met a Peter and began to put the pieces together, details that seem to have no importance until the accumulation becomes an element that turns into writing, thinking about how to translate a memory “saved with a name” as if it were a document that has the power to illuminate the path to which to give life.

The immersion inside a life that was not his own was brutal for Daniele Mencarelli; no frieze was allowed to hide the disfigurement that always had to prevail.

In this book the author shifted to the third person while always keeping the present tense because he likes to give the impression that the events happen as they are read because he feels they are less distant.

I must say that the goal was fully achieved because even me as a reader felt literally inside the story.

The novel has an antecedent: in 2000 while going for a beer, Peter meets Bianca. They recognize each other and it is love at first sight.

In 2023 Pietro is a 50-year-old man and his car breaks down in Molise, with him there isn’t Bianca, there is his son Jacopo who is 18 years old and unfortunately has very low-functioning autism.

The village where they stop to look for a mechanic: Sant’Anna del Sannio does not exist in reality although it resembles many places that each of us can identify.

Pete and Jacopo are headed to Puglia where Bianca is waiting for them to celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary.

The unexpected lasts three days and revolves around three characters: Oliviero the mechanic, Agata the bar owner, and Gaia. Thanks to her, we enter the father’s inner world and discover everything that families like theirs lack.

Basic seed: the scene as a moment of unveiling the human exactly as I was telling you about the Peter who I discovered while reading.

Daniele Mencarelli was born as a poet, poetry is able to name things, it captures the depth with respect to the scene. Narrative, on the other hand, is architecture of scenes that then takes the form of plot and psychological arc of the characters.

In fact, poetry should not be “strict poetic language,” but should live within the elements of the novel form.

Literature is a gesture that is meant to bear witness.

These words of Daniele Mencarelli find a particular embodiment in the book Fame d’aria – Hunger for air , I think.

But what struck me most was to learn about the author’s personal “hunger for air.”

Over-inked pages that give a sense of claustrophobia.

From this “hunger for air” literally comes the need to open up vertical spaces in the horizontal narrative.

The need to perceive much presence of white, that is, need to break the sentence and go to the head as if it were a need for air.

Reasoning as a poet in certain moments of the human you arrive with a broken speech. In the highest places of the human one arrives only with lyric.

A personal hunger for air.

How about you? When do you feel your hunger for air?

A CURTAIN OF PURPLE WISTERIA

A CURTAIN OF PURPLE WISTERIA

A curtain of purple Wisteria …

Do you recognize which quote this line belongs to?

The wisteria I am telling you about, however, is not located on an avenue, and for that very reason it struck me very much.

The wisteria I want to tell you about sat along a country lane, expanding in its natural, wild architecture, without being an embellishment to anyone.

I like the idea that it has done well here in Lomellina, a place with characteristics quite different from its homeland.

In China wisteria is called Zǐténg 紫藤 i.e. blue vine, even the German name: Blauregen is inspired by the color.

Wisteria, on the other hand, comes from the Greek glýkis γλύκης meaning sweetness.

Name inspired by scent therefore, rather than color. Curious, isn’t it?

What strikes you most about wisteria?

Personally, I would say the color. In particular I have the memory of the arbor at the mill where my grandparents lived.

And in general what strikes you about flowers: the scent?

What is your favorite flower

What do you associate the thought of flowers with?

I found myself thinking that, just like this wisteria, I would love for other kinds of beauty to take over space, we would need it so much, wouldn’t we?

Maybe mine is tiredness, but sometimes I feel crushed by all the ugliness that surrounds us in our daily lives, after all, little would be enough to improve each other’s lives, and instead the common trend is heading exactly the opposite.

It is said that Wisteria for Japanese culture represents love and longevity, I ask for confirmation from those who are very knowledgeable on the subject, but in the meantime I would like to take it as a wish, adding my personal interpretation of this wisteria: freedom.

Shard by shard we are released from the tyranny of so-called time. A curtain of purple wisteria partially conceals the entrance to a familiar garden… In a wink, a lifetime, we pass through the infinite movements of a silent overture.

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