Laudator Temporis Acti

Giacomo Leopardi (1798-1837), "La Vita Solitaria," lines 23-38 (tr. Jonathan Galassi):

Sometimes I sit alone, apart,
on a hillside, by a lake
ringed by silent reeds and bushes.
There, when high noon fills the sky,
the Sun paints his undisturbed reflection,
and no blade of grass or leaf
stirs in the wind, you neither see nor hear
wave break nor cicada shriek; no bird
moves a feather on a branch, no butterfly
flitters—there's no sound or movement, far or near.
Deepest quiet fills those shores,
and, sitting still, I seem to forget
myself and the world; my limbs relax,
no longer ruled by mind or spirit,
their immemorial calm
dissolving in the silence of the place.

Talor m'assido in solitaria parte,
Sovra un rialto, al margine d'un lago
Di taciturne piante incoronato.        25
Ivi, quando il meriggio in ciel si volve,
La sua tranquilla imago il Sol dipinge,
Ed erba o foglia non si crolla al vento,
E non onda incresparsi, e non cicala
Strider, nè batter penna augello in ramo,        30
Nè farfalla ronzar, nè voce o moto
Da presso nè da lunge odi nè vedi.
Tien quelle rive altissima quiete;
Ond'io quasi me stesso e il mondo obblio
Sedendo immoto; e già mi par che sciolte        35
Giaccian le membra mie, nè spirto o senso
Più le commova, e lor quiete antica
Co' silenzi del loco si confonda.

Iris Origo, Leopardi: A Study in Solitude (Chappaqua: Helen Marx Books, 1999), pp. 129-130 (after quoting lines 26, 28-32):

In this deliberate return to country myths and scenes, Leopardi—like his great contemporary Manzoni—was following the current of his time; he was sharing in the revolution which was bringing back literature from the palace to the farm, from the heroic to the quotidian. His lady is not a goddess, but a country girl on a summer's evening, bringing home an armful of fresh grass; his subjects, not kings or heroes, but an old woman gossiping on the church steps, and children shouting, and a tired labourer, bearing home his hoe. His scene is the village square, the hedgerow beneath the hill. But the square holds the whole pageant of human life, and beyond the hedgerow lies infinity.

The same lines in Geoffrey L. Bickersteth's translation:

At times I seat me in a lonely spot,
Upon a gentle knoll, beside a lake
Ringed with a silent coronal of trees.
There, in the full noon of a summer's day,
The Sun his tranquil image loves to paint,
Nor grass, nor leaf stirs in the windless air,
No ripple of water, no cicala's shrill
Chirping, no flutter of wings upon the bough,
No buzz of insect, voice or movement none,
Far off or near, can ear or eye perceive.
Those shores a deep, unbroken stillness holds;
Whence, sitting motionless, I half forget
Myself, forget the world, my limbs appear
Already loosened, neither soul nor sense
Informs them more, and their age-old repose
Is mingled with the silences around.