Ugo Foscolo, Alla Sera, Nightfall



Ugo Foscolo                                                    
(born Niccolò Foscolo)


(1778 – 1827)


Italian writer, revolutionary and poet
(Neoclassicism, Pre-Romanticism literary movements)


                                                           
                        Alla Sera

Forse perché della fatal quïete
Tu sei l'imago a me sì cara vieni
O sera! E quando ti corteggian liete
Le nubi estive e i zeffiri sereni,

E quando dal nevoso aere inquïete
Tenebre e lunghe all'universo meni
Sempre scendi invocata, e le secrete
Vie del mio cor soavemente tieni.

Vagar mi fai co' miei pensier su l'orme
che vanno al nulla eterno; e intanto fugge
questo reo tempo, e van con lui le torme

Delle cure onde meco egli si strugge;
e mentre io guardo la tua pace, dorme
Quello spirto guerrier ch'entro mi rugge.

          Nightfall

Perhaps because you are the image

of the silence of the grave, I cherish when you come to me

o evening! Whether summer clouds

and warm winds hold you in soft embrace,

or you send restless and long shadows

from frost-filled air to the universe,

you always fall, desired by me, and the secret

pathways of my heart you gently hold.

You make me wander with my thoughts on paths

that lead to the eternal void, and all the while,

this evil time fleets by, and with it masses

of care depart, and it dissipates along with me

and while I contemplate your peace,

the warrior spirit that roars within me sleeps.

Alla sera is one of the 12 sonnets of the definitive edition of Foscolo's 'Poems'.
The sonnet conveys the strong feeling concerning the difficult human and political moment that the author was going through.

Paraphrase

Perhaps because you are the image of death, I am thankful when you come to me; when serene winds accompany you, or when you bring long and stormy nights upon the earth, and enter the secret pathways of my soul, quieting it softly, you push me to think of the eternal void, and meanwhile this guilty age passes away, and my worries pass away, and I dissipate also, and the warrior spirit which roars within me sleeps.