Fyodor I. Tyutchev

Silentium!

Speak not, lie hidden, and conceal

the way you dream, the things you feel.

Deep in your spirit let them rise

akin to stars in crystal skies

that set before the night is blurred:

delight in them and speak no word.

How can a heart expression find?

How should another know your mind?

Will he discern what quickens you?

A thought, once uttered, is untrue.

Dimmed is the fountainhead when stirred:

drink at the source and speak no word.

Live in your inner self alone

within your soul a world has grown,

the magic of veiled thoughts that might

be blinded by the outer light,

drowned in the noise of day, unheard...

take in their song and speak no word.

trans. by Vladimir Nabokov

*

    A vision

                    There is an hour at night when all the world is silent.

                    Sights are seen.  Miracles are done.

                    The living horse and chariot of creation

                    stampede the heavens in unbridled run.

                    Night draws in, thick Chaos heavy on the seas.

                    Oblivion presses on the earth, like Atlas.

                    Alone on the Muses’ virgin soul

                    in seer-dreams the gods inflict unease.

*

                    You saw him in polite company,

                    one moment happy,

                    getting all his own way,

                    then gloomy, absent,

                    unsociable, full of mysterious thoughts.

                    Such was the poet.  You despised the poet!

                    Look at the moon: all day it seems

                    exhausted, a pitiful wraithe.

                    Wait till night falls,

                    then you see this radiant god

                    enfolding sleeping copses in its beams!

Translation F. Jude



*

Est in arundineis
modulatio musica ripis

È armonia nelle onde marine,
nelle furiose dispute degli elementi.
Melodiosa musica, il fruscio
scorre tra i fluttuanti giunchi.

In tutto è un ordine inviolabile,
e piena consonanza è nel creato;
solo nell’illusoria libertà
ci sentiamo divisi da natura.

Di dove, come è nata la discordia?
Perché nel coro universale l’anima
non canta come il mare, e il giunco
pensante mormora, protesta?

E dalla terra alle estreme stelle
non ha risposta fino ad oggi
il clamore della voce nel deserto,
il lamento dell’anima braccata?