Resolutions

(a poem)

My translation of ‘Buoni propositi’, the first poem from Sofia Riva’s Scritto sul corpo (Casafanti, 2022). Reproduced with the permission of the author.

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This year, I’ve decided, I’m no longer going to care.
I'll show up at work in clothes from the night before,
shambling, swearing, sweating, stinking of sex,
splash water on my face, and start my day.
The children I look after will play a game
of staring with lordly impassivity
at the classroom wall. This time I'll let them win.

This year, I've decided, is going to be called
the Year of the Window, every midmorning spent
pitying passers-by on their coffee breaks
and feeling smug. When that mad derelict
stands at the café and yells about the vax,
I'll buy him a slice of cake and leave him be.

I'll buy myself one, too. This year, after all,
I'm not going to bother with money.
Spare coins I find in my pockets I'll give away
or use for making decisions
or spend on drinks for party boys in bars
looking to slum it of a Friday night.

I'll read a lot this year, though what I read
will not be useful, edifying, or long.
O god of squibs and trifles, I will pray,
preserve me from the epic! No more revising
for exams that don't exist.
This year I will forget what I forget.

I will not give up smoking. In fact I might smoke more.
I'll cough blue clouds of it in people's faces
when they complain. They won't be sure
if the white flecks in my hair are ash or age.
I'll drink each night away, of course, although
I suppose I won't need to. I won't care.

I'm not going to read the news at all this year.
When people talk about it, I'll pretend,
and if they ask me what I'm going to do
about the sick, the dead, the dispossessed,
I'll reply: ‘It's not my business. I don't care.’—
only this time it will be true.

This year the bastards will not get me down.
I can manage that myself. And if my friends
(assuming I still have friends) disapprove,
I won't say that the world is made of mud.
I'll invite them for dinner at my filthy flat
and serve champagne and oysters and declare:
‘I promise to do better.’

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