Claudio Pagelli was born in Como in 1975. He graduated in Law, since 2004 he is president of the Heliant Cultural Artistic Association. He wrote poetry collections: L'incerta specie (2005); The visions of the clover (2007); I ate the crazy flower (2008); Buchi Bianchi (2010); Papez (2011) and The Vocation of the Whale (2015). Also: three artistic plaquettes (Ed. Pulcino elefante); the plaquette of haiku Bestiario with sushi (Ed. I Tipografni del Typografo). Awarded in numerous literary competitions, his poems appear in art catalogs, trade magazines and theme sites. Translated into Spanish, it was published in the Periodico de Poesia U.N.A.M.
Given for sure that insects will be the food of the future - as long as they convince us to nourish them - in this collection they have a more noble function: that of nourishing the mind and the heart of the readers, as an alter ego not only of the poet, but of men all. The idea is original (Gozzano - as recalled by the Prefactor - had not been able to complete his work "Butterflies: entomological epistles"); it is made with short compositions, cleaned of any redundancy, which seems to leave the reader attentive - the pleasure of continuing the story, following his own imagination. Intense squares, in which anthropomorphism is evoked enough, since insects and humans - both belonging to the animal kingdom - are differentiated not only by biology and classification, but also by behaviors and characteristics of their existence.
The poetic artifice, therefore, is a continuous resemblance and distinction, very different from other illustrious poetic and other less anthropomorphisms, in which the climate is frankly satirical or manifestly joking.
Pagelli offers us, instead, an elegant and discreet poetic atmosphere, evoked by a double observatory, the human eye and that of the insect: it results in a silent dialogue, sculpture in the round, rather than bas-relief; although the eye and the orientation of the insects are different, the reference, the compass, in fact, is always an acrobatics made of stars.
Rather than multiply the words, I think it is appropriate to let the Poetry speak
la libellula
la medusa di paladino
scruta le onde del lago
come un guardiano severo,
nel ventre della villa
va in onda la conferenza
degli oracoli digitali
(numeri scaltri come serpenti
che pietrificano anche i fiati)
sulla lingua dell’acqua
si specchia una libellula
nel suo volo incurante
degli occhi delle gorgoni…
lo scarabeo
anche nelle notti senza luna
trova sempre la sua strada
(l’ho letto da qualche parte
una rivista, un articolo di giornale)
o nell’aria che respira nebbia
come in quella poesia di Whitman –
un’acrobazia fatta di stelle
è la sola bussola che gli occorre…
il ragno
il ragno ci guarda dall’alto
(appeso col suo filo
all’angolo buio del soffitto)
chissà che ne pensa
del nostro chiacchiericcio
nel suo parapendio domestico,
quali le priorità dell’aria
e della terra vista al rovescio…
la zanzara
sotto una luna artificiale
la venere del lampione
improvvisa una danza
fatta di curve e d’aria
(l’occhio che cade
nella trama della tentazione)
trenta euro per l’amore
dice con sorriso da gatta
scostando dal viso un insetto –
l’ostinata zanzara
che fiuta sangue nel vento…
Claudio Pagelli, La bussola degli scarabei, Ladolfi Ed. Borgomanero (No), 2017
Maurizio Rossi