Non c’è un paradiso: there’s no paradise.
Ebben. Con un sorriso–smile–here’s some advice:
Never let unthinking hordes chase you from your dreams,
though you’ll find tedious and deafening their screams.
Reach for a star so high that your hand vanishes.
That way, you’ll grow taller and find this banishes
fear of heights, not to mention toning all your limbs.
That’s when you’ll enjoy what great shape you’re in
for the next stage, which will be chasing one’s own tail.
You’ll try avoiding this one, but to no avail.
Then thoroughly exhausted, build yourself a nest.
Come to stillness, meditate, take a little rest.
Admire the tapestry woven in the skies
where spirit sings and rainbows brighten up your eyes.
Declaimed here: https://aprillynnjames.com/track/4735387/non-c-e-un-paradiso-3-2026
The opening sentence came to me one night. I may have been studying Italian at the time.
Madison is one of my biggest cheerleaders. And there are times when the sonnets give hints that he definitely knows what’s coming down the pike for me. “Chasing one’s own tail” seems like an apt description of the last few years, if not the last decade, as one career foray after another just failed to take root. And the solution, “Come to stillness, meditate, take a little rest” has always turned out to be the best way to deal with puzzling predicaments.