Thought you folks might like to hear the latest track from my poetry and music group, The Duende Project.  On this cut you’re hearing the guitar work of Steven Lanning-Cafaro, who founded the project with me nine years ago.  Hope you enjoy it!

Trinity Tango

This is part of a larger project we’re very excited about.  I’ll share more about it as I can over the next couple of weeks.

Here’s the text:

Trinity Tango

I have a black dog
who once was well fed;
I have a black dog 
who used to be fat.

Now he’s meatless, he’s weightless,
a hard-beaten skin drum,
heavy only with snarls 
and with dark eye-shine.  

He jumps from the rug
where he sleeps while I’m sleeping
and lands in my bed, 
looking to chew me; 

I hate him, I love him,
I own him, I fear him;
I sing him a lullaby 
to get him to heel —

c’est tout, c’est tout
is French for that’s all;
basta, basta,
Italian for enough.
I can’t give you my heart,
for my heart is too tough;
c’est tout, basta, 
that’s all, that’s enough.

The mother, the father,
the lovers, the brothers;
the liars and smilers 
who’ve drained all the colors;

whose once-red appetites
are still salt on the wounds
from the end of a cutlass 
one could scarcely imagine;

they come to my bedside,
push me to the floor;
I speak to their shadows, 
cast my one good spell —

c’est tout, c’est tout
is French for that’s all;
basta, basta,
Italian for enough.
I won’t give you my soul,
for my soul is too rough;
c’est tout, basta, 
that’s all, that’s enough.

Ho mai creduto che sarebbe stato facile ?
Ho mai creduto che potesse essere ignorato? 
Ho mai creduto 
che potesse divenire polvere
o vento o racconto di fantasmi
o fiaba …

o essere dimenticato ?

(Translation)

Did I ever believe it would be easy?
Did I ever believe it could be wished away?
Did I ever believe it could become dust
or wind or ghost story
or fable…

or forgotten?

I wake in the morning
or even the evening.
There’s breakfast or supper. 
There’s something to do.

I stand up, I move. 
I don’t see the dog.
If there’s a question to be answered here
I know what to say —

c’est tout, c’est tout
is French for that’s all;
basta, basta,
Italian for enough.
I can’t give up my heart,
my heart is too tough;
c’est tout, basta, 
that’s all, that’s enough.