Io se fossi Dio [English translation]

If I were God...

and I could actually be him

if not me, I don't see who else!

If I were God

I wouldn't allow people's sly tricks to get me

I wouldn't be an amateur either

I would always be there!

I would really be everywhere spying

or better yet, criticizing

exactly what people do

For example the petty burgeois

he's so annoying

he never does big sins,

he's never intensely sinful.

Besides, the poor guy, he's too miserable and too little

and even knowing that God is more accurate than a Swedish

he thinks that God does not count or does not see little mistakes.

That's why

If I were God

I would prefer the past century

If I were God

I'd regret the ancient rage

where people used to hate, and then to love

and where enemies were being killed!

But I am not yet

in the heavenly kingdom

I am too traped

in your ruins...

If I were God

I wouldn't be so stupid

to believe only in the heartbeats

or only in the tricks of reason.

If I were God

I would surely be very complex

and very detached

like You should be!

If I were God

I wouldn't have saved up,

I would have done a better man.

Yes, ok, I admit

it's wasn't that good,

and that's why, in order to preach what's right,

once in a while, I send someone down there

but then people love to interpret

and create even a bigger mess!

If I were God

I wouldn't have done the mistakes my son did

and about love and charity

I would have explained myself better.

Actually it's not at all normal

for an oridary mortal

in the name of bullshit like compassion or hunger in India,

to have so much love put aside

he doesn't even dream about

so that you feel like asking:

"After that, how does he manage to be such a bastard?"

If I were God

I wouldn't be so reduced like you people are

and If I were, for sure I'd die

for something important.

Unfortunately, the occasion

of dying nicely

doesn't always present itself

and even the most daring (courageous) adventurer

dies wherever it happens

and not even very convinced.

If I were God

I'd do what I please

Of course I wouldn't be permissive

I'd beat my son

I'd be severe and fair,

I'd curse over and over again the English

like I was asked

and if I had the chance

also the Africans and Asia

and then the Americans and the Russians

I'd beat the militancy

as well as the mysticism

and I'd slap

Voltaire's followers, the thiefs

the supid people and the bigots:

because God is violent!

And God's slaps

stick everybody to the wall!

But I am not yet

in the heavenly kingdom

I am too traped

in your ruins...

Till now, we've joked!

But in the end, one of us

sooner or later will catch the taste

and using God's excuse will bring out

eveything he thinks he should.

And you girl,

you tell me that it's not true

that the petty bourgeais

is only a little bastard,

[but] that he is a real delinquent

a rascal, a jerk in all the ways, a rotter

and that he even tried to rape his daughter!

I, like an invented God

like a fictitious God

I take courage

and I tell my opinion and say:

"Let's hope that your father

will be shot in his b u t t dear girl!"

That way, for the newspapers he will become

a brave father.

If I were God

I'd really curse the journalists

and especially all of them

who for sure are not good persons

and where you search, you always find good things.

Journalists, companions, you're too thirsty

and you don't know how to take advantage of the rights you have

you still have the freedom to think

but you don't do that

and in exchange you pretend to have the freedom to write

and to take ingenious and ingteresting pictures

of supportive presidents and of crying mothers.

And in this Italy full of dismay

how courageous you still are, you throw yourself

without trembling for one moment:

canibals, necrophils, De Amicis followers and artful people

and we'd actually say pleased (people).

You throw yourself in the human diaster

with the tase of the tear in close-up

Yes, ok, I admit

the diappearance of the paper sheets and of the press

maybe would be a crazy thing

but if I were God

facing so much [mental] deficiency

I certainly wouldn't have had the superstition of the democracy!

But I am not yet

in the heavenly kingdom

I am too traped

in your ruins...

If I were God

naturally, I'd shut up so many peoples' mouth

in the heavenly kingdom, I wouldn't want ministers

and political party people between the "bollocks"

because politics are disgusting

and does harm to the skin.

And all those who play this game

after all it's a game of power, it's repugnant and contagious

like leprosy and typhus

and all those who play this game

have certain faces (sides)

that makes you sick when you see them

no matter if they are greasy Christian Democrats

or old friends of the Conservatory Party

They were born really ugly

or at least they all end up like that.

If I were God,

from the top of my throne

I'd see that [being in] politics it's just an ordinary job

and I'd like to say, it sees to me Plato,

that politicians are less ans less philosophers

and more and more bastards!

it's a well-accomplished man

who without ever looking back, slides on the world

that slides on words

even when he doesn't seem to, or when he doesn't want to.

My radical comrade

I don't know who gave you the word "comrade"

but in the end it suits you

it's already disqualified anyway

radical comrade

rider of every tiger, sly man

you're actually moving very well in the middle of this big mess

and while on one side they shoot at random

and on the other the prisons get crowded

who gives a damn about the people!

My radical comrade

take charge of the civil rights

and of the stupidity that makes democracy

and set up a new referendum

this time for knowing

where do dogs have to piss!

My Socialist comrades

yes, you too, insinuating, artful and fat

Socialist comrades

with your thoughtless alliances

of the Right wing, the Left wing or of the middle

with your updated people

the new ones out and the old ones in

Socialist comrades, come out

because this is the year of the red carnation and of the rising suns

Come forward with the progress myth

and with your disgusting ambiguity!

Say thanks to the pervasive folly!

But I am not yet

in the heavenly kingdom

I am too traped

in your ruins...

If I were God

I would really not have any more patience

I would reinvent moral

and I would make the trumpets sing

for the Last Judgement.

You'll ask me why is it so partial

my very personal Last Judgement?

Why don't my trumpets sing

for the assassinations, for the rapes

for the young drug addicts and for the bombs?

Because the other face of the medal isn't gone yet.

Being God, it's not that I don't want these things

being God, I can't say for sure that they can't be judged

or even, like those who are afraid say, unmentionable

but as the man that I am and have been

I have spoken about us, the ordinary mortals

I don't understand the others

I get scared, they don't look the same to me.

About them I can only say

that from the people (masses) they have managed to obtain

the stupid mercy for the policeman

about them I can only say

that they have taken away from me the taste (the pleasure)

of being personally pissed.

As a man, I can only say what I feel

that is: just the image of the great confusion.

But if I were God

I'd also be invulnerable and perfect

then I would't be scared at all

that way I would be able to shout, and I'd shout without restraining myself 'cause it's something stupid

for the fact that the members of the Red Brigades have gone really mad!

This is the difference between us and the unmentionable

I can speak about us because I know who we are

and maybe we cause more disgust than fear

but in front of the terrorism or of the one who kills himself, there's just dismay.

But if I were God

I wouldn't let this dismay bother me

and as for the politicians

I'd be as severe as I were at the beginning

because martyrs

have never made God change His mind.

And if my God who is still getting used

gets mad because of those who fire guns

He also gets mad

if an ordinary politician

because he shot a member of the Red Brigades

becomes the only statesman.

If I were God

that God who I'd need like I need a mirage

I would still have the courage to keep on saying

that Aldo Moro, along with all the Christian Democracy

is the biggest responsible for 25 years of Italian gangrene.

If I were God

an irrisponsible God, extremely wise

I would also have the courage to go straight to jail

but I would like to say that Aldo Moro still remains

that face he was!

But in the end all this is stupid

because logically

if I were God

I would rather see the Earth from far away

and maybe I wouldn't manage to get used

with this daily challenge (fight).

If I were God

I wouldn't care about hate and revenge

nor about forgiveness

because distance is the only revenge

the only forgiveness!

And then

I will finish by saying that if I were God

I would retire at the countryside

like I have done...

• Artist:Giorgio Gaber
• Album:Ιl teatro di Giorgio Gaber