Vito Elio Petrucci (1923–2002)

Petrucci – another great follower of Firpo and in some ways his imitator – composed, over the course of his long career, a large number of poems that testify to his love of Genoa and of nature, which sometimes descend into folklorism, but – in his finest moments – are enchanted in a dreamy atmosphere, in a time suspended outside of time, that is particularly evocative. He was also an indefatigable promoter of a somewhat conventional idea of “Genoeseness”, and he produced countless collections of proverbs, memories, cooking recipes, old period photos and annotated postcards. As a playwright and director of theater and radio, he was a proponent of Govi’s theater, as such repurposing old Govian texts, or writing new ones along the same lines, in a generic attempt to update and modernize them, but most of the time with rather wishful and dubious results.

Porto Pigheuggio

The best part of Petrucci’s poetry is where the author, following in Firpo’s footsteps, describes the Ligurian landscape in inspired and dreamy terms, suspended in an aura of eternity and idealized perfection, broken only by sudden reminders of the concreteness of everyday life.

Porto Pidocchio is a small inlet of the Portofino headland, between Camogli and Punta Chiappa, whose name refers to the narrow space reserved for boats.

O l’é scì e no o creuso de ’na man
con ’n’ægua ciæa che ti ghe lezi a vitta.
Nisciun parte de lì pe andâ lontan,
ma a barca ch’a gh’arriva a tia un sospio:
à picco, sott’a-o macco, a treuva un nio.
Træ ræ desteise, doî galanti amosi:
un silençio ch’o vâ ’n’eternitæ.

Se o çê

One of Petrucci’s favorite themes in his poetry is his dissatisfaction with the present world, in which the dreams and hopes of childhood and youth are irretrievably erased by modernity, new concepts, ideas and prejudices, hand in hand with the disappearance of “Genoeseness”.

Se o çê o no l’é papê da succao
con pertuxi che mostran paradisi
d’argento e d’öo
mi no l’ammio ciù.

Se o l’é äia e vento
e mondi d’atra gente,
chi me daiâ in derê
i seunni che gh’aveivo fasciou,
imbottii con de nuvie,
rinfrescæ de rozâ?

E quande o præve

E quande o præve o chiña e o s’inzenoggia
intonando pe tutti o Tantum Ergo
sento sempre ’na voxe da-a mæ drita.

Un fî de voxe, ato, tutt’amô.

A voxe ch’ò sentio ninnou inta chiña,
a voxe che sentià a mattin che o sciöco
o mæ nomme o ciammià de casa in casa.

Patella

A sense of lost fatalistic abandonment exhales from Petrucci’s verses, hopelessly tied to his land and its myths.

Ammiavo ’na patella
attaccâ a-o scheuggio
dove l’ægua a ven sciù pöi a va via
mesciâ da ’na caressa de l’æxia;

mi che lì vixin a-o mâ
gh’eo da mattin a-a seia
à domandâ ’na veia.

Graffioñe

Compared to Firpo’s poetry, Petrucci’s verses are distinguished by a greater sensuality, a radical attachment to life and the earth.

Cheugge ’na çexa graffioña da-a pianta
gròssa e rossa,
e mettila in bocca tra i denti e sciaccâ.
I denti l’arvan
comme lapri södi de ’na bella figgia.
Gh’é ’n gusto de saliva de vint’anni
e a preuva che gh’é vitta dappertutto.

E tutto saià doçe

In the poet’s perspective even death is not scary – it represents the end of all turmoil, all pain, as well as the end of the race of time and a total pantheistic immersion in nature, with which one identifies.

E tutto saià doçe
quande sentiò cantâ e çigae.
I cavalli corrian sensa galòppo,
né scorriâ o carossê.
Mi no savià ciù giâ o feuggetto do mæ lunäio:
sentiò cantâ e çigae.

Sensa respio

Foreshadowed in this dialogue with the stones is the poet’s complete fusion with his land and his city, which seem to incite him to take up all their concerns, their vicissitudes, and to become their spokesman. For Petrucci, the end of Genoa coincides with the end of the world itself.

Se ti me veddi parlâ con unna pria,
e prie de chì e conoscio uña pe uña,
no dîme ninte: a l’é ’na meschinetta
che drento a gh’à tutte e facce do mondo
ma a no l’à mai incontrou
o scöpello de l’òmmo
ch’o ghe dagghe o respio.

De vòtte me contan de stòrie
che chi e savesse scrive
saieiva grande poeta.
Coscì sò che a fin de tutto
a vegnià a neutte apreuvo
à l’urtimo seunno de l’urtima pria.

Sciòrto pe vedde a luña

Here, as in the following poem, brief glimpses and lyrical illuminations, in full Firpian tradition.

Sciòrto pe vedde a luña
ma no l’accatto.

’Na ciæbella vant’ëi
a ne portava ’na zimma
sciù pe-o carroggio.

Gh’é unna luña pe carroggio

Gh’é unna luña pe carroggio:
uña piña, uña meza,
uña sgaibâ comme ’nna grondaña.

Serenata

In his last collection of poems, O monòlogo, included in the personal anthology Un vento doçe (1993), Petrucci manages to combine folkloric and traditional themes with his meditations on the end and the beyond of life, as in this Serenade, where the mystery of the afterlife is brought back to everyday reality, in which a husband returns home to his wife, an evening like any other.

Se int’unna neutte de luña
piña, da açendine o çê,
quande i scheuggi an o cado
de l’urtimo raggio de sô,
un boffo leggero d’æxia
o te picca a-a giöxia…
arvi, Maria, che son mi.

Se unna mattin de borrasca,
quande l’é neigro in sciô mâ
e pâ che a vitta co-o sô
a no agge coæ de tornâ,
o roscigneu a seu canson
o â tiëse insemme a-o magon…
arvi, Maria, che son mi.

Se a seia do longo libeccio
ch’o pòrta cavalli con lê,
che coran in scê creste do vento
e addrissan i zòccoli in çê,
ti senti angoscioso into sproin
o freido crio de l’öchin…
arvi. Maria, che son mi.

Se un mezogiorno qualonque
de ’n giorno ch’o n’eu mai finî,
quande succede de tutto
e tutto deve vegnî,
ti senti da-e Vigne sunnâ
unna campaña stonâ…
arvi, Maria, che son mi.