EDITORIAL

H

e passed away at the beginning of September, on the threshold of Fall.
From Puglia, born in Monte Sant’Angelo, but resident in Manfredonia, Cristanziano Serricchio was 90 years old and was famous as a poet, writer and intellectual capable of conjugating classicism and modernity, metaphysical poetry and intimist poetry, utilizing diverse registers of writing.
In Bridge, in the last few months, we had published two of his poems from a collection published in the United States by Gradiva Publications.
I had intended to go to Manfredonia to meet him, dedicate an interview to him, to talk, amongst other things, of a recent proposal to put forward his candidature for the Nobel Prize for Literature, by a committee in Manfredonia and, unanimously, by the Regional Council of Puglia. But his passing leaves the answers only to his lines.
To commemorate him we have chosen to publish another of his poems, a joyful poem, which closes with some short, lovely lines on light. We have chosen his message of hope. And I think that light, with all its possible connotations, is a crucial key to reading his poetry.
Synonyms of light, like day, dawn, sunshine; all can be found in so many of his lines. Light, also understood as hope or projection towards the infinite, seems to filter through his poetry even when he speaks of graves, of death and silences. Like in one of his moving lyric poems dedicated to his late wife: Free in the brilliance of light/ in the emptiness of the house you will come to tell me about the sun.
In his lines there are sails, seagulls, flowers and insects; all strongly illuminated, highlighted, by the clear, sharp light of the South where he lived. And there is “the light”, explicitly cited countless times: Life is an abyss of light.
At Fall’s onset, in which the light begins to wane, and we miss it already, we can try to find it again in the legacy of a poet who certainly loved her above everything else.
At heart, we are all thirsty for light, that light that in his lines with delicate wings/ spreads its magic.