The last night of the year

The Dream

by Agar Alessia Barboni

A rope in a ring-a-ring o’roses
among the haste and the cheer
goes through the world, over people’s noses
in the last night of the year.
On this evening so dark and cold
as snowflakes merrily descend
magic and poetry in the sky unfold
and disappear in the end.
It is the mind
that always lies and knows
that it is not hard to find
allegories in shows.
All becomes white as time goes by
as snow falls on each tree, roof and bay.
Snow dances and sings a lullaby,
transforms outlines, blows the colours away,
and silences each noise, talk and cry.

On the rope suspended in mid-air
the rope-walker looks down to the ground,
the world is changing over there,
there are celebrations all around.
Ash-faces
in masked towns
masked faces
in countries turned upside-down,
ephemeral smiles that are soon gone
and toasts that are not shared
because everybody drinks alone
to a world that has never cared.
But, as she is fighting against gravitation
the rope-walker understands
that in a reality in search for imagination
some people still walk holding hands.

Connecting the mind to the heart
everybody looks for love at any price
in this end that is a new start
hiding the shameful vice.
All in all the daring mind
lies as it keeps looking for
what the heart manages to find
what people feel at the core.

The rope is taking its flight
through the world and crosses the space
from infinity to a skylight
open wide to the sub-base.
All wrapped in her sheets
the little girl sleeps safe and sound,
there is a rope above the streets
and the rope-walker goes round and round,
the girl sweetly says in her sleep:
‘I am a little child
and my imagination is so deep
that it makes me run happy and wild,
imperturbably climb the sky
and find a world that isn’t there
a beautiful world where I fly
and feel free to go everywhere.’
And now that the truth is pretty clear
to the mind as well as to the heart
in this last night of the year:
‘Where does the dream end and reality start?’