A Masked Ball, Attilio Bertolucci, 1971

February 11th, 2026 | CULTURE |

“Some with cymbals and drums, some with laughter and shouts
with wigs sliding forward over cheerful eyes

thus animates the riverside packed with snow then
that on the last evening of Carnival, rotating, approaches

at twelve o'clock and burns on the dials facing
a flattering invitation or a warning to the citizen?

But these are not clowns who have gracefully
the shelter of the foresi transformed into a theatre

sleeping now and still hours before
of the bitter Wednesday that is tomorrow in remittances

and provincial car parks located upstream
downstream far from here where a slow tournament

of cars parades proceeds and gets lost
to reappear lights pouring in streams

on the tireless provocateurs and their
boots spotted with white bodices

where gold binds lamb's hair
soaked from a winter now at its irreparable end…

The transvestites of Parma were once shop assistants
schoolboys, tailors and barbershop apprentices

in double apprenticeship under experienced masters
in both arts and not always in bel canto

with the pleasure of betraying the genius of the place if it is
Cremonini calling with such sweetness

the gentle and singing animal instrument
ambiguous with voluptuousness to the convulsed mind…

They come and go from nearby cities
to the little capital city of Autrefois that its citizens

wicked and rude people do not want the duke to insert it
in the dialogue in the deadly embrace America Russia

under the intertwined sign of pop art and progressive democracy.
But let them approach with caution, as they might seem

shy customers or moralistic voyeurs and come
mocked or hit by infallible snowballs

and recognize in these celebrations of Parma
in these fanciful and impudent costumes

the local serpentine line resumed
with unheard-of contempt for danger

from children of the people and unhealthy villages
blooming of sisters with sweet legs whose

steal attitudes and foundations
because of the need to be guilty first and foremost.

It's snowing again and the foreigners are leaving
the remaining ones do not give up

they invent agreed-upon mimics
to the infinite descent of butterflies from the sky.”