A Gemstone in the Rock

Copyright © 2012 by Donato Placido and Olga Matsyna.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2012906302

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4691-9642-8

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                   Ebook                                      978-1-4691-9643-5

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Contents

Preface

Faith

Disillusions

Absence and Silence

Disobedience

Rebellion

Encounter

Epilogue

Post Epilogue

Authors’ Biographies

Prefazione

Fede

Disillusioni

Assenza E Silenzio

Disobbedienza

Ribellione

Incontro

Epilogo

Post Epilogo

Biografie Autori

I dedicate this book to my mother, woman in the kitchen, but royal in paradise. I trust blindly only her and dedicate to her my life and my art.

Donato Placido

Preface

Once Bukowski was asked: Do you believe in God? He replied: "No, I believe only in horses.

I do not know why we always realize things when it is too late. I’ve also bet on horses for a period. But, differently from Bukowski whom I respect so much, I quit horses and bet on God.

Really, I think it is for this faith that I found myself with my back against the wall. Against the wall was the first title I wanted to give to this book. There are a lot of people in the world: tramps, prisoners, all types of emarginated people who are alienated just because, in my opinion, they do not manage to keep pace with a cheering occidental cult of efficiency, to keep up with the rules for which the society, the system did not forgive them. But Christ said: I came to the world for the ill, not for the sane. Thus, is it really true the last will be the first? Maybe, if, as far as I know, a probable God does not consider things the way people do. Anyway, what I have never understood is: there is a baby born from Gypsies and there is another one born from a rich American family. What is the fault of the first one whose destiny is immediately signed? A mystery! So, A Gemstone in the Rock, in its essential message, is an invitation to bet on God as it is the only chance we have in our life.

It is also an invitation to pray—to pray more often during the day. Even at work. But without putting the entertainment aside: it gives colours to our life. That’s why the title is A Gemstone in the Rock: life is nothing but a precious stone in the rock: you can observe it in its splendour but you cannot take it with your naked hands. As far as the emarginated people are concerned, let us help them bearing in mind that, differently from what the main part of respectable Catholics think, to help them is not at all a walk of pleasure. I say it with a poem: How much pain I get for a kiss to a poor wretch! This book has got a particular: it is like a human being in the course of his life with it’s high and low moments between faith and total loss of courage.

P.S. As far as my poem Now (Faith) is concerned, for a question of a dramaturgic effect I left the sequence of the passion events according to my poetic license".

Have a good time reading!

Sincerely,

Donato Placido

This book was born as a synthesis of our writings, our thoughts and vision of the world. I made Donato’s acquaintance while he was focused on hypotheses of a staged version of a Pirandello’s play. His poetry published and appreciated in Italy, inspired me. I proposed to him being published abroad. I read Donato’s material thoroughly and put it in a sequence (I would rather say I had to cut it like a movie: his writings evoke movie-like images). This book owes to me its structure, order and some chapters: trilogy Loneliness of Light I wrote on the basis of apocryphal Gospels found in the Dead Sea in 2004, in particular, Judas’ and Magdalene’s Gospels. However, the dialogue between Judas and Magdalene (staged in 2006 in Moscow at an international festival of directing plays) and Magdalene’s monologue are of pure intuition (or, if we prefer so, of artistic invention). Other book parts of which I am the author are: the dialogue Puppets of freedom inspired by Danton’s Death by Georg Büchner, extracts from Disillusions (money, power, female love), extracts from Absence and silence (The end of the world, Silence, loneliness and…), the whole chapter of Encounter (which is Donato’s novel of the same name I put in a nutshell and in blank verse) and my poem on a true love, Till the darkness. In a human life everyone passes from happiness to despair, from the idea of God dissolved in everything to the idea of his absence, one stakes on the material goods accumulation, on power, on love, even on the idea of freedom—but then one notices all these concepts are only illusions, just glimpses of a happiness apparently close, but actually unachievable because everything escapes from us, everybody leaves us sooner or later. It is hard to accept it. A disobedience, a rebellion to life comes up. Till a new hope. Till a rebirth. Till we understand only who really loves us can follow us till the darkness (and even beyond, if we accept mysticism). A Gemstone in the Rock is a Donato’s poem I suggested for a title and for the final conclusion to our common work.

For you who are reading us in English I am still more present in the book as every single word of Donato Placido (not only mine) gets to you in my translation that I would define like transfusion of poetical blood. I learned to love Donato’s poetry and, as a translator, recommend you Love denied—I am proud of it, as for its meaning determined by my co-author, as for the shape of this poem translated. It is the core of what I call life: the isolation for a love which is impossible, with the persistent thought of a brother to search for… I dedicate this book to those who believe in me and especially to those who don’t.

Olga Matsyna

Faith

On a bus                                                                                    (by Donato Placido)

I noticed a kid

Who enjoyed playing

With his little car.

I don’t know why

I smiled and thought,

‘If you can do it, kid,

Play with your car

Your whole life,

Like I did.’

A week ago or so,                                                                                    (by Donato Placido)

From a narrow

Bus window,

Passing close

to Foro Italico,

I saw

a whore at the corner.

Today, passing there again,

I found a bush in blossom.

IT DOESN’T ADD UP                                                                (by Donato Placido)

I’ve reckoned with my family,

My children and relatives.

And it all adds up.

I’ve reckoned with my job, my savings,

my slippers in the evening—

and it all adds up.

I’ve reckoned with my career,

with the holidays I’m due

and with my friends—and it all adds up,

nevertheless,

I’ve got a feeling

something is not going well.

I don’t know.

It’s as if it didn’t add up all the same.

Why so?

It’s true, I haven’t taken into account

That, maybe, there’s a god creator.

An angel of God                                                                          (by Donato Placido)

Will pacify your torment.

Do cross yourself,

you’ll find an armed soldier on your right.

It’s a God’s angel

Even if God may not exist.

I’ll cross myself

Even if Passion might have been useless.

I’m a man

And I need to pray!

The best thought                                                                            (by Donato Placido)

A man can make

Is to think of Our Lady

And to invoke her.

Every morning commit

Just an act of your faith

with a creed and invoke

the holy spirit, you’ll see

how the world will be changed.

Let’s pray God to exist.                                                                (by Donato Placido)

Let’s thank God for God’s existence.

Death                                                                                            (by Donato Placido)

is no more than death.

This is true,

With death everything ends.

But, in fact,

everything should just start with it.

Death is useful for one thing:                                                         (by Donato Placido)

to get a friend in the sky.

They say, ‘There’s a remedy                                                         (by Donato Placido)

for everything except death.’

I say, ‘There’s a remedy

for everything, death included,

Resurrection.’

And they say, ‘Before God                                                           (by Donato Placido)

we are all like a grain,

grain of sand in a desert.’

But I add, ‘A grain of sand

in a desert that’s endless.’

You gave me life—it’s not enough to me;                                     (by Donato Placido)

the universe, the constellations, billions

of stars do not suffice. The infinite

and the eternity are not sufficient.

Beyond what is eternal, infinite

There’s God if you look for him or if you try

To understand where he comes from and why

He is and where and when and who he is.

God says: Help me to help you                                              (by Donato Placido)

I asked                                                                                   (by Donato Placido)

A young priest,

‘And Jesus?’

He replied,

With his eyes

Scintillating,

‘Jesus is great!’

I know, I do risk,                                                                          (by Donato Placido)

But I have no choice

Than to bet on Our Lord!

Can you do anything                                                                (by Donato Placido)

That could be certain tomorrow?

No! Keep silence then,

Pray. Be as humble as you can.

At times we should bow our heads                                              (by Donato Placido)

Just when we look at the sky:

‘Yes, Master,’ we all should say,

‘Yes, Master,’ because it’s hard,

Too hard sometimes, but He knows

And wants tender words from us!

In a quarrel with your brother                                                     (by Donato Placido)

Please be humble and admit it:

You are guilty—be a creature

That is dear to God. Please, do it!

‘How many times,’ I wonder,

‘should I still forgive my brother?

I have almost lost my patience!’

‘Seven times’ seventy-seven,

Only then you will admire,

Love the miracle of life!

And when they insult you,                                                          (by Donato Placido)

Point you out, chase away,

Just the moment you’re leaving,

Do repeat to yourself,

‘This is all perfect joy!’

And your pain will melt down

The way snow does in the sun.

If something not good                                                                (by Donato Placido)

Happens to you,

Think always,

‘God knows

What he is doing.’

We need our neighbour                                                                (by Donato Placido)

Like the air we breathe.

Let’s not forget it

For the world’s like this,

Like this it’s made by God.

At the same time

no one is essential

In this world of the Lord.

REFLECTION                                                                            (by Donato Placido)

I noticed by chance a tiny luminous blue colour spot reflected by a bigger blue strip on a computer cover. I thought: "If this little centimetric reflection didn’t exist, the universe of billions of stars weighing billions of tons, each of which situated at a distance of billions light years from another—the whole universe would be in a chaos. Thus, the smallest being or object—it’s true—needs the biggest one. But the biggest being or object also needs the smallest one. Applying it to life on the earth, the biggest being necessarily needs the smallest one because the universe cannot be separated from this earthly life. Lastly, applying it to the gospel, we can ascertain Jesus spoke of the importance of the smallest ones meaning human beings. Coming back to what we have affirmed above, we can conclude the biggest beings need the smallest ones. Jesus, wishing it or not, had enunciated a closest link having a correlation with the universal law of reflection applicable to eartly life and to a man who is closely connected to the universe or to the universes. Therefore, we can state that the Gospel, being fundamentally a spiritual book, is also a scientific text.

The only true book                                                                        (by Donato Placido)

Is the Gospel.

And the moment has come

For a true revolution:

revolution of spirits

with no arms at all.

Let’s pray love!

Let’s prohibit

‘All hatred!’

‘You gave me a slice of bread,                                                      (by Donato Placido)

I put what I could find

On it. What could I add?

The salt that gives us life.

And then I kneeled before

The world diadems see.’

‘At night avoid feeling alone.                                                       (by Donato Placido)

For there are skies who talk to you.

Closed is the night with all her stars.

Forgive me, but here I stop                                                           (by Donato Placido)

On this my long way for a while.

How much do I still have to walk?

I’d like to realise it and smile.

I’ll have so rich an award:

The universe of constellations!

My faith comes and goes,                                                             (by Donato Placido)

It’s shaky, unsteady.

It’s strange, but I’m close

To trust the blind already

That each sacred host

Being given to us

Inside has at most

The body of Christ.

HOPE IS CERTAINTY, FAITH IS CERTAINTY                        (by Donato Placido)

We all are born

With a feeling of hope.

We could have been born

even without it.

Hope, as everybody knows,

is to expect for something to happen.

Therefore, it is waiting.

Waiting for something,

maybe a deliberation,

to come up, sooner or later.

That’s why hope is certainty.

Certainty of something to happen,

Something positive, for sure,

considering that—

and nobody can contradict it—

we are born with this feeling

and we bring it inside

our thought for a lifetime.

Now we get to faith.

Since faith is a mystery,

it is also, though,

a hope for the existence

of a probable god

and, for the Christians,

for a probable resurrection.

Now, analysing thoroughly,

We are stating

Faith is also based

On the hope for an event.

Having already considered

Hope is certainty

And deducing faith

Is based on hope,

it is obvious that,

being hope a certainty,

faith is also a certainty.

Therefore,

excuse me