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What Sex Is Death?
Dario Bellezza
Selected and translated by Peter Covino
Wisconsin Poetry Series
Sean Bishop and Jesse Lee Kercheval, Series Editors
Ronald Wallace, Founding Series Editor
“Dario Bellezza—mentored by Morante and championed by Pasolini, who called him ‘the best poet of the new generation’—remains one of the essential Italian voices of the latter half of the twentieth century. As an out gay man, he wrote transgressive poems of love and sex and polemic (by turns tender, brash, angry, defiant) as the gay-rights struggles of the sixties and seventies morphed into the AIDS crisis of the eighties and nineties. Thanks to poet-translator Peter Covino’s scrupulous yet daring versions, which are labors both of love and skill, American readers can now trace the arc of Bellezza’s career, from his early Invective and License to his final Proclamation on Glamor—each an aching, disruptive testament to ‘this infected world.’”
—Geoffrey Brock
Winner of the Wisconsin Prize for Poetry in Translation, selected by Geoffrey Brock
Over the course of twenty-five years, Dario Bellezza—Italy’s first openly gay, major prize–winning poet-novelist-playwright—published more than twenty books, including eight poetry collections. His debut, Invective and License (1971), established him as a bold, daring poet, energetically exploring love, sexual transformation, and death. He later won the Viareggio Prize, Italy’s most prestigious poetry award, and the Montale Prize for lifetime poetic achievement. After his death, two volumes of selected works appeared, and in 2015 an edition of his collected poems arrived to great acclaim. Yet, until now, his work has never been available in English.
Bellezza embraced a variety of forms, from unabashed love lyric to political narrative, and the fervor of his voice makes a compelling argument for his lasting importance as one of the most remarkable poets of the late twentieth century. Award-winning translator Peter Covino offers a wide-ranging selection of the most representative poetry from Bellezza’s career. Influenced by Rimbaud, the Beats, and the growing European gay rights movements, the poetry in this volume remains both innovative and timely. Ranging from stray cats in the graveyards of Rome, to the literal and metaphoric fallout from the Chernobyl disaster, to the joys and disappointments of random hookups, Bellezza’s dazzling visions will sparkle in readers’ eyes like sunspots long after they complete this magnificent volume.
“Exited from a tomb
at the English Cemetery
I don’t know how long you’ll last,
a month, a year:
you remain sole anchor of salvation
in a life uncertain of
tomorrow.”
“Excerpt from “Cats”
Dario Bellezza (1944–96) was one of Italy’s most significant and prolific poets, authors, and playwrights. He published more than twenty books, including eight full-length poetry collections, over the course of twenty-five years, and embraced his identity as an out gay man in an era of increased polemicizing of gay rights and harsh opposition by the Vatican.
Peter Covino is an award-winning translator, editor, and poet. He is an associate professor of English at the University of Rhode Island, the founding editor and faculty advisor of the Ocean State Review, and a founding editor-trustee of the nonprofit press Barrow Street Inc.
Praise
“In this groundbreaking book, Italian American queer poet Peter Covino for the first time introduces an English-speaking audience to Dario Bellezza’s riveting work through a complex theoretical introduction, incisive selection, and nuanced translation. The volume emphasizes Bellezza’s invaluable impact on the emergence of an Italian queer culture—here conceptualized as providing an innovative perspective on contemporary Italian literature—while it also contributes to the shaping of a transnational Italian queerness.”
—Caterina Romeo, author of Interrupted Narratives and Intersectional Representations in Italian Postcolonial Literature
Table of Contents
Introduction: Oltraggio e scandalo – (Out)rage and Scandal: Rediscovering Dario Bellezza
(i-xv/xvi-xxii) with endnotes
Da Invettive e licenze / From Invective and License (1971)
Quale sesso ha la morte? / What Sex Is Death?
Infante di una infanzia un po’ cresciuta / Infant of a slightly precocious infancy
L’insonnia che mi prende / The insomnia that grips me
Ascoltavo la morte nel mio sogno / I listened to death in my dream
A Elsa Morante / To Elsa Morante
A Pier Paolo Pasolini / To Pier Paolo Pasolini
Se viene la guerra / If the war comes
All’Ambra Jovinelli / At the Amber Palace
Ti cadono i capelli, qualcuno / Your hair falls out, someone
Da Morte segreta / From Secret Death (1976)
da Apologia / from Apologia
E abbandono morte. Giocattolo di Dio. / And I abandon death. Plaything of God.
da Paranoia / from Paranoia
Ad Anna Maria Ortese / To Anna Maria Ortese
Ho paura. Lo ripeto a me stesso / I’m afraid. I repeat it to myself
da Appunti / from Notes
L.S.D. / L.S.D
Fosse l’ultimo amore il tuo / If yours were the last love
da Storia Personale (1974) / from Personal History (1974)
La mattina, birre, “salade,” un po’ di caviale / In the morning, beer, “salade,”
a bit of caviar
Da Libro d’amore / From Lovebook (1982)
da Amore / from Lover
Nella mia notte il pessimo tuo mattino / In my night the worst of your mornings
Sulla mi vita scatenata non entri / You no longer enter into my unraveled
Il passato della felicità. La sigaretta / The passing of happiness. A cigarette
Di là ti masturbi senza lode / From the other room you masturbate without praise
Dove riposi io guardo. / Where you rest I watch.
da De profundis: / from The Depths:
Pallido, scarmigliato. I tuoi capelli / Pale, disheveled. Your hair
Le trombe squilleranno / The trumpets will blare
Ti leccavo tra le sporche lenzuola. / I licked you between dirty sheets.
Da io / From i (1983)
Polvere e Cenere / Ashes and Dust
da Il Viaggatore D’Ombra: / from Traveler of Shadow:
Non raggiungerò il Sublime perché sono vivo / I will never arrive at the Sublime because
I’m alive
Penso che dovrei avere un figlio / I believe I should have a child
da Gatti: / from Cats:
Uscita da una tomba / Exited from a tomb
Rimorso a guardarti nella confusione / I feel remorse looking at you in confusion
Cessa di puntarmi come il cane / Stop staring at me like the dog
Una giornata di maggio, piovosa / May, a rainy day
La gattità / Catness
da io / from i
Dura legge sapere che niente / Harsh law to know nothing
Felice te passero (impudicizia mi spinge / Happy sparrow (shamelessness drives me
da Il Dopo: / from The After:
La Fine Del Mondo / The End of the World
Quando si abbandona la strada / When one abandons the road
Non c’è niente di meglio che barare / There’s nothing better to barter
Da Serpenta / From Snakewoman (1987)
Lingua, tu non rispondi, né apri / Tongue, you do not respond, nor unleash
da Lo sguardo punisce chi guarda / from The Gaze Punishes the Gazer
Ma il quotidiano insiste. Ed io volo / But the quotidian insists. And I fly
da Lodi del corpo maschile: / from Praise of the Male Body:
Se è giovanetto il corpo maschile / If the male body is boyish
Né maschile né femminile, il suo sguardo / Neither male nor female, that gaze
Ragazzo laggiù, tesoro nascosto / Hey boy down there, hidden treasure
Ad Hart Crane / To Hart Crane
Il Tevere si perde nella notte / At night we lose sight of the Tiber
Sottoponte / Below Bridge
da Serpenta: / from Snakewoman:
Fuggono tutti i miei giorni / All my days escape
Quando sarai chiamata in Paradiso / When you are called to Paradise
Da Libro di poesia / From Poetry Book (1990)
da Il Viaggatore D’ombra: / from The Traveler of Shadow:
Lacrima amoris: / Lacrima Amoris:
da Casa: / from Home:
La mia casa, l’entrata / My House, the Entrance Way
Un Trasloco / A Relocation
AIDS / AIDS
I giovani padri / The Young Fathers
Pratiche attività / Practical Activities
ll’ “Appendice 1968-1988”: Colosseo / Coliseum
Da L’avversario / From The Adversary (1994)
I / I
II / II
III Roma 1989 / III Rome 1989
VIII / VIII
da L’avversario / from The Adversary
L’avversario / The Adversary
In Calabria / In Calabria
da Ritrovate / from Rediscovered
L’ombrello di Elsa / Elsa’s Umbrella
da Inquiete larve / from Restless Larvae
Ieri un famoso libro mi tenne compagnia / Yesterday a famous book kept me company
Scaricato alla stazione a Martina Franca / Cast-off at the station in Martina Franca
da Congedi / from Good-byes
Gatti / Cats
Proclama sul fascino / Proclamation on Glamor (1996)
Il Fascino / Glamor
Marilyn / Marilyn
da Il Nulla: / from Nothingness:
Traditore, menagramo, sporcificante assedio / Traitor, mishap, filthy besieger
Laggiù, oltre il telefono / Down there, beyond the telephone
Sei Dio forse / You are God perhaps
Ora, tra i morti, mio libero fratello / Now, among the dead, my liberated brother
Saresti morto di AIDS / You would be dead of AIDS
Congedo / Farewell
da Appunti per un romanzo in versi / from Notes for a Romance in Verse
Di nuovo ecco la ripetizione / Once again behold repetition
Bibliography
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Larger images
February 2025
232 pp. 6 x 9
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