Buon compleanno [English translation]

The advantage of having available

at least the first hours of the afternoon and strolling,

is all in your almost abstract, habitual

dosage of the care you give to your dog,

and I can’t but let you go on with it.

It’s like that that I pictured ourselves as grown-ups,

who, among a billion or more looks, heroes, vertigos, promises, hugs…

so much time caressing each other…

and such a stumble in my heart it was for me then,

— you don’t know how much — my looking at you standing,

like a flower beneath the snow would stand.

Happy birthday, my wonderful love;

if only I could explain it in words,

how much they give to me, the single summer hours spent with you.

What are all emotions made of,

and where do they wait slowly and distractedly

for a storm or an earthquake

to provide an excuse to unleash them from that remote corner of every stupid fear?

It happens like this, in casual encounters,

that two lovers — as closed in on themselves as the fist of the loneliest people –

find their arms to be like wings,

that fate consciously turns a dream into truth,

a dream where a flower blossoms on the snow.

Happy birthday, my wonderful love;

if only I could explain it in words,

how much they give to me, the single fall hours spent with you.

Happy birthday,

and if in a thousand of these [years] they will find our remains, joined forever:

‟they weren’t soldiers” the stars will say

‟just two simple lovers”.

I think about people who no longer have common sense or wonder

for this condition of ours, a condition of being strange animals

who — whatever gesture, cry, heartbeat or blink —

always turn out to be practically the same.

Happy birthday, my wonderful love;

if only I could explain it in words,

how much they give to me, the single winter hours spent with you.

Happy birthday,

and if in a thousand of these [years] they will find our remains, joined forever:

‟they weren’t soldiers” the stars will say

‟just two simple lovers”.

• Artist:Max Gazzè