di Sergio Mauri

We can start this brief cultural route around Trieste, quoting one of our best poets and intellectuals:
Umberto Saba. From his poem “Trieste”:

I traversed the entire town. Then I climbed a steep slope, crowded at first, deserted further up,
closed by a low wall:
a nook where I sit alone; and it seems to me that where it ends
the town ends too.
Trieste has a surly grace. If one likes it,it is like a rascal, harsh and voracious,
with blue eyes and hands too big to offer a flower;
like a love with jealousy. Up from this slope every church, any street
I discover, whether it takes to the huddled beach,
or to the hill where, onto the rocky top, a house, the last one, clings.
All around circles all things a strange air, a tormented air,
the native air.
My town that is in every of its part alive,
has a nook made just for me and my life,
pensive and reserved.

In these lines the poet is trying to capture the charm of the town where he’s living. A charme that
changes every season, turning Trieste into a destination which is always different, depending on when
you come. Trieste has a charisma which has fascinated many writers and men of letters, since a long
time ago.