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Category Archives: BRANCALEONI
Maurizio Brancaleoni has had poetry and prose featured in numerous journals and anthologies. In February 2023 he published his first short story collection “New Parables and Other Oddities”. He has a bilingual blog where he posts literary gems, interviews and translations.
Per Urna Chahar-Tugchi
S. Maria in Aracoeli
26-12-2022
Santo Stefano:
la sua voce raggiunge
l'Ara del cielo
For Urna Chahar-Tugchi
St. Maria in Aracoeli
12-26-2022
On Saint Stephen's Day —
her voice reaches into the
Altar of the sky
Beatrice Rana:
il legno carezzato
dal vino vecchio
Beatrice Rana —
the wood caressed
by old wine
Prokofiev: dopo
la sonata riposo
per il violino
Prokofiev —needing
rest after the sonata
the violin
messa a Natale:
ogni canto tradotto
in lievi gesti
Christmas Mass —
every chant translated
in light gestures
Maurizio Brancaleoni has had poetry and prose published in numerous journals and anthologies.
He has a bilingual blog where he posts literary gems, interviews and translations.
The end of the world is nigh. So what? This doesn’t change things. All my life I’ve been wishing to do something important, go down in history and now I know that it’ll never happen. So let the apocalypse come, who cares. Finally something really democratic. Not even the greats of the past ages are safe, everything will disappear from the face of the earth. Pardon, that’s going to disappear too. The Big Crunch, the return to the singularity: few believed that it would really happen.
I was talking about that with a female friend just yesterday.
– I don’t see why we should get desperate. In any case, each one of us would have to die sooner or later.
– You’re insensitive as usual.
– At least we’ll die together – I said, although my love is unrequited.
– You creep me out – she replied, and started chatting with her friends on Facebook.
I remained at her disposal anyway. Shortly thereafter, she ordered me to go and rent all the disaster movies I could find because she would throw a party that night.
They want to overcome the fear of death, I said to myself, by mocking it, laughing at it. It was a good guess: on my return, I find her making out with two guys in skeleton costumes.
– The best is yet to come – she says.
– I’m partying too?
– There’s always the dog.
That was one of her friends. Soon after other people dressed up as the occasion demands – gravediggers, ravens, worms and whatnot – walk in with crates of beer and any kind of commercially available drug.
Moral: there was little interest for the movies and only I and the “dog”, wearing a tombstone costume, watched them, until she left me to participate in an orgy with two skeletons, a coffin and a mausoleum towards the end of the night.
At dawn they had all sunk into comatose sleep, as in one of those music videos that stage the typical post-party morning of the latest pop star. I walked out in the garden and watched the sun rise.
I’m still here now, contemplating the sky. It won’t be long until the end.
Komm, süßer Tod!
Really, that’s what life was? We could do without it, thanks. Adieu.
Maurizio Brancaleoni has been widely published in several journals and anthologies. He has a bilingual blog where he posts literary gems, interviews and translations. The original version of “Who Cares About The End of the World” was first published in 2012 in an anthology of apocalyptic short stories.
Maurizio Brancaleoni’s literary output has appeared in a wide variety of journals and collections. To date his art has not gained as much attention. More drawings, paintings, collages and comic pages are available here.
What It Lacks
It’s the lyrical accent
that's lacking, the sharp snap
of expressionist dramaturgy,
the steadfast steer of the infested line
whose absence is bewailed
pathetic, stupid are the subjects
your life is trivial and hopeless by now;
being poor, you suck up
raw chatter and companions
and pull them in
the nobleness of verse traded
for a few threepenny tricks
rhyme the most humiliated
and rightly so
you're dead to sense too
under your pretty shroud of postmodernism
I take you along in my daybook
as seed, fruit and offspring of mine
on regional trains and eatery tables
Maurizio Brancaleoni has had poetry and prose featured in numerous journals and anthologies. In February 2023 he published his first short story collection “New Parables and Other Oddities”. He has a bilingual blog where he posts literary gems, interviews and translations.
A Brilliant Solution
Following the recent onset of awareness
on the part of major political figures
national and international
of the criticality of the current conditions
of planet Earth, home to a wealth of creatures
among which algae, human beings,
and beavers
mind-boggling and praiseworthy measures have been taken
grounded on the unshakable respect towards
polar bears, almighty lobbies,
and pictures and videos depicting
malnourished children
relentlessly
dying
being the above-mentioned strategy
— although already criticised by imbeciles and activists —
set out to address these all-encompassing issues
in an unprecedented manner
as everything points to the fact
that nothing else might be done
at the time being
that is,
hope everybody dies
before hunger and climate change
might be held responsible
for their deaths
Maurizio Brancaleoni has had poetry and prose featured in numerous journals and anthologies. In February 2023 he published his first short story collection “New Parables and Other Oddities”. He has a bilingual blog where he posts literary gems, interviews and translations. In 2016 the Italian version of “A Brilliant Solution” was among the poems selected for a poetry and photography contest organized by the cultural association Civico 32 and the journal Versante Ripido.
dormito troppo: la formica di caffè sul mio pollice
overslept — the coffee ant on my thumb
binario 1: la gran croce bianca del mendistrillone
platform 1 — the big white cross of the hawkbeggar
Roma Termini Christmas Tree
Roma Termini: il santo in ciabatte guarda l’albero
Roma Termini — the holy man in flip flops gazes at the Christmas tree
ite missa est: e fuori l’inferno a bocca aperta
ite missa est — and outside hell gaping wide
notte d’estate: incollata al lenzuolo la mia insonnia
summer night — glued onto the bed sheet my insomnia
Bet
Santo Ignazio: s’inginocchia il turista per uno scatto
at Saint Ignatius — a tourist down on his knees for another shot
sbianca la luce gli sbrecchi della tazza: sera d’inverno
the light whitens the nicks on the cup — winter evening
Fountain and Pigeon
tombola: l’amore della bimba per le monete
tombola — the little girl’s love of coins
spia paparazzo dalla finestra sull’unghia dell’alluce
a paparazzo spies from the window on my big toe nail
pesce scontato: il giorno dopo saltella ancora
discounted fish — the day after it’s still leaping
San Paolo
acchiappaspettri: annoiati a morte tutti i fantasmi
specterbusters — all the ghosts bored to death
penna ïn resta respingo moscerini dal volo a zig zag
pen in rest I repel zig zag flying gnats
igienizzata persino la salvietta: spesa post-Covid
even the Kleenex gets sanitized — post-COVID shopping
Posing Crow
Giorno dei morti: nel cric croc dei muri si rispondono
Day of the Dead — through the creaks and squeaks of walls they respond to each other
solo d’estate: persino i ragni hanno le loro mosche
lonely in summer — even spiders have their flies
affreschi a Pisa: anche Satana soffre di emorroidi
frescoes in Pisa — even Satan suffers from hemorrhoids
Urban Intimacy
studio medico: contaballe aggancia sexy menope
doctor’s office — fibber hooks up with menopausal hottie
per il dottore: al mio turno tocca al nuovo arrivato
at the doctor’s — when it’s my turn the newcomer is up
Roman Ruins
pronto a scattare parte prima l’allarme del ranocchio
ready to shoot the frog alert goes off first
stasi ardente: tutt’uno con l’antenna l’uccello grigio
scorching stasis — one with the antenna a gray bird
La Fornarina
La Fornarina: la folla si delizia della tettina
La Fornarina — the crowd delighted with the tit-ina
Maurizio Brancaleoni has had poems and short stories published in numerous journals and anthologies. In 2018 he received an MA in Translation Studies with a thesis translating and commenting on Thomas Wolfe’s “Passage to England”. In recent years he localized Adrian C. Louis, Jean Toomer and Justin Phillip Reed. Earlier this month, he put out his first short story collection “New Parables And Other Oddities” after a twelve-year publishing career.
