FROM a. TO Berlin
Link of my video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KitBMXt1_SY
By Gabriele Nugara
“It was July, in Berlin, and you told me you were pregnant…”
TURINLISBOAPARISCLUJBUCURESTISIBIUBERLIN
My video is a letter to a daughter about to be born.
My video is the description of a travel, my recent life story,
An adventure through Europe, the never ending discovery of the self,
A journey from west – Portugal - to east – Romania,
From south – Italy – to north – Germany,
Always dedicating some of my thoughts to the memory
Of Chris McCandless, the main character in “Into the wild”,
A beautiful story, leaving nevertheless a sense of injustice,
Of mistake, of self-misunderstanding…
The secret of life is maybe more in sharing than in escaping,
This is what I learnt from the unpredicted big event of these last years:
The birth of Marlene. This is why I decided to stop my journey,
The physical one, staying close to a wonder, going on telling stories
That concern the private side and journalistic contents,
From Berlin Kreuzberg Friedrichshain to all Europe,
Remembering the famous sentence of Goethe
I read on the wall of the hospital where I first met my baby:
“There are two things children should get from their parents: roots and wings”
And Europe is exactly still a creature needing wings and roots.
After the words of the greatest poet of Germany
I would like now to end this presentation with a poetry of mine (sorry, Goethe!)
Pin, chink, germ, crop.
The womb a film. Diaphragm, aperture.
Dark uterus impressed with existence:
Half a centimetre, even less, a pebble.
I now see the notches on the spore-sized
Gauge, counting back - recalling first
The coals of a one-night drug,
Streetlamps melted orange in my head,
That time, and wax became my teenage face,
Much sightless was the post-flood damage.
Only with growing of urban lichens,
Gutter’s damp stains and rotten graffitis
On the opposite façades, my eyesight got back.
I would figure by scattered taints. Profile, edge.
Next to the small case of the gas-meter,
Down in the courtyard, like a holy shroud
Under the stairs suddenly emerged,
Terrifying supernal face. Encrustation.
Blunder, refulgence, coloring, ignition,
Dante between the curtains and beatitude in a jail.
Soviet Union.
Jubilee linen hanging out with neighbour’s
Clothes, falls down injected in the wall,
Where another wall has fallen.
How does that July flashflood apply from the belly,
Distends the lighting point, echography makes iris
Of a tiny body swimming in the dark.
Lantern. Daughter. Still unborn.
