Variations


icona Variazioni spring

Today it is the beginning of the spring,
and nature begins living again
without hiding its treasures any more.
The mountains on the horizon
seem to be nearer and less inhospitable,
the glass and the cement of the late-twentieth-century architectures
appear warmer.
The town is less a town.
The majestic nature lays down its graceful tribute
and nobody is allowed to escape -
unbelievable it might be, but nothing has changed.
Emerson triumphs and encourages us
to have faith in the future.




















Variation The Wind Rose

On the rocks your fate is written
and the Wind Rose divides the horizon.
It has bloomed, and a strong cheerful scent
announces the bitter-sweet victory
over the brute power, overwhelmed
by another Mighty, with a firm expression
and a blessed heart by the Summer Solstice.
A music sounds--the roaring sea
and the released winds,
making a lively bunch of friends with it.
And the sea speaks and tells
explains and questions,
answers and denies
but more often is compassionate
and magnanimous, interpreting the Silence--
"only let your thoughts be of equal greatness"...



«In private places, among sordid objects, an act of truth or heroism seems at once to draw to itself the sky as its temple, the sun as its candle. Nature stretcheth out her arms to embrace man, only let his thoughts be of equal greatness. Willingly does she follow his steps with the rose and the violet, and bend her lines of grandeur and grace to the decoration of her darling child. Only let his thoughts be of equal scope, and the frame will suit the picture. A virtuous man is in unison with her works, and makes the central figure of the visible sphere.»
R. W. Emerson, Nature, 1836
























Variationwoods

«In the woods, is perpetual youth. Within these plantations of God, a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years. In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life, -- no disgrace, no calamity, (leaving me my eyes,) which nature cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground, -- my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space, -- all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or particle of God. The name of the nearest friend sounds then foreign and accidental: to be brothers, to be acquaintances, -- master or servant, is then a trifle and a disturbance. I am the lover of uncontained and immortal beauty. In the wilderness, I find something more dear and connate than in streets or villages. In the tranquil landscape, and especially in the distant line of the horizon, man beholds somewhat as beautiful as his own nature.

The greatest delight which the fields and woods minister, is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me, and I to them. The waving of the boughs in the storm, is new to me and old. It takes me by surprise, and yet is not unknown. Its effect is like that of a higher thought or a better emotion coming over me, when I deemed I was thinking justly or doing right.»
(Nature, 1836)




















Variation Utopia


May I ask you a favor?
Stop turning up your noses.
You know, it doesn't fit you well--
What are those wrinkle?
Sharp canines are peeping out
from behind your bristly beards.
Please, stop turning up your noses
as you are saying--that's sheer utopianism!
Are there any alternatives?
It's hard, my friends, to be watching
your concrete faces and to think--
there are not any alternatives!
I know, I know--it's no use insisting
it is not yor fault, and then
you are kids
this is none of your business
if the toy breaks down
and life is hell.
You can't expect too much from them!
Oh well, if that's the case
it's all right, and if you really want,
if the reason is on your side
I'll be holding on to my Utopia.
But--please, stop turning up your noses...
At least it doesn't fit you well!

windrose

«Gold and iron are good
To buy iron and gold;
All earth's fleece and food
For their like are sold.
Hinted Merlin wise,
Proved Napoleon great,--
Nor kind nor coinage buys
Aught above its rate.
Fear, Craft, and Avarice
Cannot rear a State.
Out of dust to build
What is more than dust,--
Walls Amphion piled
Phoebus stablish must.
When the Muses nine
With the Virtues meet,
Find to their design
An Atlantic seat,
By green orchard boughs
Fended from the heat,
Where the statesman ploughs
Furrow for the wheat;
When the Church is social worth,
When the state-house is the hearth,
Then the perfect State is come,
The republican at home.»
(R. W. Emerson, Politics)



windrose







This page hosted by Get your own Free Home Page