THE SOLDIERS

A blink of dust, my grandfather was shooting because he had to defend a homeland.

I have not been in battle but I have fought many wars.
Black crosses on the heart and mud on the hands.

My grandfather was in the trenches, risking his life to defend our nation from the Nazis.

I did not know that there were men exterminating children.

Last beats for wars that have begun and never ended. Flowers on the graves of friends and girlfriends, stars fallen in the desert sunlight.

Rivers that fill the houses with tears, honors without choice, a deserted pit.
Children who scream and have no guilt.

War kills whoever decides it but whoever makes it is still dying.

( To all the dead sons, to all the dead fathers, to all the dead daughters and the dead mothers. To all the people who died from causes decided by other people. R.I.P) 

STORY OF A BLIND HEART

It was at that moment that I found myself facing a dark figure with a veiled face. Suddenly, by chance, without my expecting her or her looking for me. We found ourselves, and all of a sudden my heart appeared on the palm of his right hand. Big, red and pulsating, big enough to allow me to recognize its various components in their smallest details.
The figure moved his right arm towards his chest, and our hearts met for the first time. Maybe minutes passed, maybe hours or maybe days, and the figure continued to hold my heart in its hand, while it beat in unison with the organ of the mysterious person. If then this figure was human.
Days and days passed, probably weeks, and the causes of our lives continued to be known.
Until, something changed. His right arm moved away from the figure's chest, taking his hand and heart with it. The separation brought a cold detachment between us, something akin to the Berlin Wall. Walls and walls to divide us; our people had lost their tune, they were no longer traveling on the same wavelength, nor were our hearts composing more wild musical chords. The figure began to emanate negativity, and this struck me deeply: my heart, up to that moment of a brilliant red, began to blacken. Black and gray took possession of me instant after instant, and the figure in front of me performed an action entirely new to me: taking the heart, it began to tighten. I fell to my knees, while a severe pain I had never felt struck not only my chest, but my whole body. The pain crept into every vein and artery of my body, every organ and system. Chills certainly not of cold began to flow inside me, and as I closed my eyes praying that all this would end, I felt big tears wet my cheeks. I opened my eyes again, and saw my heart, now entirely black, becoming dust in the hands of the figure.
So slowly my vision blurred, and, falling to the ground, as I saw for the last time the figure to which I had entrusted my own heart, I thought bitterly how blind I had been.

BORN IN THE STONE

So ready to disappear
I was
so featherweight
and apologize to the skin
with every dust of air
for undue occupation,
so impressed by the transparency
I was
to make glass
tersissimo
to dazzling mornings
and smell of wave
between propped bodies.
So strictly useless
the soul
my
to keep it green next to it
in the long course of the so-called
dating
without any unhinging
of speech.
"Then? Then?"
Then
I slipped out
in hard peel
world skin,
I make a silence
on evil,
a cloak
of insolent beauty
terrestrial.
I cannot command
this flow
it is a great work
of clear yield
with a majestic current,
I am a word to the light
I was born.

WATER

Taste some of this water
from my fingers
of this which still has the flavor of a cloud
that will return cloud
there is like a concordant ending
a silent conspiracy of circles in this alphabet
and so you too will return
how do you go now
that I pass without touching you
it is the same simplicity of the stone
ready to turn into dust
it is the same simplicity of silence
silence, only, perfect.

FULL OF LIGHT

Time passes and leaves traces of stifled thoughts in the mind
Dancing of luminous moths as if they were air and dust. 
Where there is no rule to tell lies about people in balance. 
Nothing that can hurt to take refuge to protect ourselves from us. 
Because life goes like a crazy pinwheel. 
In going back and starting again in extreme need. 
Incoherence and nostalgia for acts left unfinished and empty. 
You were left to search in the mud for the habits of conscience. 

STORY OF A FIREMAN

Dust and a window on the sea.
Memory leaves no room for silence.

December:
my role advancement exam takes place.
An important milestone.
A red helmet.

Around mid-January,
I am transferred to a new command.
I began to work hard, to give my best, as I have always done, and I receive a letter of praise from the Commander.

May:
Dust.
A window on the sea.
Memory leaves no room for silence.

Everything stops.

Internal bleeding.

Today my ordeal begins.

July:
First surgery and after a few days
I'm finally going home.
October:
Colon reconstruction surgery.
December:
Rebbocco, last intervention.

Dust and silence.
There is no room for memory.
The red helmet has dust.
The means are at a standstill.
The blue lights, do not blink.
The sirens don't sound.
My heart, it lost its beats.
I'm scared.
I have courage.

January:
I find that the evil has not finished with me and in April,
my left kidney is removed.

Dust and silence, without ever losing your smile.

The throbbing pains, block my breath.

I close my eyes with gritted teeth, thinking back to what I have done in life.
To the friends who are here, to those who have left me.
To the people I love and to those I have loved.
To the arms that I embraced.
To the words I've never forgotten.
And I keep hoping.
And I keep smiling and fighting.

An internal infection tried to lead me to death.
But in September, they save my life.

I am still fighting.
I am still suffering.
I am still smiling.
I am still living.

My name is Michele,
I'm a team leader of the fire brigade.
I blew the dust off.
I wiped the tears of smoke from my eyes.
I stroked the head of those asking for help.
I've learned not to give up.
I have learned to love.
Not to lose the smile, even in pain.
I'm a man.
And I'm still alive.
I won.

Never give up, because every day more, in this life ...
It's a new sky,
that can give love.

Be afraid and then ...
Have courage.