from Meno Universe: “22:40” by Guido Cupani – translated by Patrick Williamson


 
 
MY BROTHER TEACHES ME HOW TO HOLD A GLASS
because life is here, he says, where thoughts
end and briscola algebra begins,
you should write about it
                                            and my brother
reads Dostoevsky and has rosy cheeks
as in that photo at the lake in eighty-five
when I was the biggest, and embarrassed
of the shy smile that say
s
he’s nearly as happy as then
 
 
 
Guido Cupani, Italian poet and astrophysicist, lives and works near Trieste. Poetry collections: Meno Universo (Dot.com Press, 2018), Le felicità (Samuele Editore, 2015), Qualcosa di semplice sulla neve (Edizioni Culturaglobale, Cormòns, 2013). E-book: James A. Potato, Ad ventum? (four Christmas stories) (Kindle Direct Publishing, 2014). Poems in Smerilliana, Zenit Poesia, Versante Ripido, Poetarum Silva, Atelier, Cinquesettecinque, Nazione Indiana, Circumference, Poem, and Perìgeion. Translations: Lettere – a te (Samuele Editore, 2012); Patrick Williamson, Traversi, Beneficato and Nel santuario (Samuele Editore, 2018, 2015, and 2013). Guido also collaborates on Perìgeion and Fare voci, and has notably won first prizes in Poesia Onesta 2016, Albiatum 2016, PAPS 2015, Giuseppe Malattia della Vallata 2015.

Patrick Williamson is an English poet and translator. Editor and translator of The Parley Tree, Poets from French-speaking Africa and the Arab World (Arc Publications, 2012) and translator notably of Tahar Bekri, Gilles Cyr, Guido Cupani, and Erri de Luca. Most recent poetry collections: Traversi (English-Italian, Samuele Editore, 2018), Beneficato (Samuele Editore, 2015), Tiens ta langue/Hold your tongue (Harmattan, Paris 2014), Gifted (Corrupt Press, 2014), Nel Santuario (Samuele Editore, 2013; Menzione speciale della Giuria in the XV Concorso Guido Gozzano, 2014). Founding member of transnational literary agency Linguafranca.