To Himself

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Giacomo Leopardi

translation by Gilbert Wesley Purdy

Now you will rest forever,
My tired heart. The fabulous deceit
That I myself believed eternal has ended.
Ended. How sharply I feel,
In we of the dear deceit,
There is no hope, desire being spent.
Rest forever. So many
Palpitations. Your flutterings
Serve no one, nor do you dignify the earth
With your sighs. Life is bitter and empty,
Nothing more. The world is a slough.
Calm yourself now. Despair
For the last time. Fate gave your kind
No gift but death. At last
Nature disdains you, the brute
Power that, lurking, imposes the common day,
And the infinite vanity of all things.




Gilbert Wesley Purdy has published poetry, prose and translation in many journals, paper and electronic, including: Jacket Magazine, Poetry International (San Diego State University), The Georgia Review (University of Georgia), Grand Street, SLANT (University of Central Arkansas), Consciousness Literature and the Arts (University of Wales, Aberystwyth), Orbis (UK), Eclectica, and Valparaiso Poetry Review. Links to his work online and to a selected bibliography of his work in paper venues appear at his Hyperlinked Online Bibliography.

Also at Virtual Grub Street by/about Giacomo Leopardi:

• The Giacomo Leopardi Page (with links to holographic manuscript images, essays, poetry, translations, photos and more);
• The Infinite by Giacomo Leopardi;
• To the Moon by Giacomo Leopardi.
  
  
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