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L’infinito
The Hyacinth Review
The Hyacinth Review

L’infinito

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May 15, 2023
Translated into English by Alan Bern. "L'infinto" by Giacomo Leopardi. In public domain. Infinitudes Teno's thought Leopard's hill A thick child's finger measures the endless lines between the hatches on the wood rule, dizzy from counting in another language. Later, shorn sheep jumped the trimmed hedge, landing back, lambs again, pranced off on a measured rack toward a deeply colored sun, rising or falling, dark enclosing the child like a lid. The Infinite Always dear to me this solitary hill and this thicket that screens out much of the view of the farthest horizon. But sitting and gazing out, I frame in my mind endless spaces beyond and silences that surpass anything human, and a deep stillness; there for a single beat the heart is not afraid And as the wind comes murmuring among these plants, I begin to compare that infinite silence to this voice: and recollect eternity and the dead seasons past and the present one alive before me. and her sound. So in this immensity my thinking goes under and sinks and this ship going down is sweet to me in this sca.
L'infinito, trans. by Alan Bern

Alan Bern, a recently retired children’s librarian, is a poet,…

The following translation of “L’infinito” in the triptych was previously published by REUNION: The Dallas Review in 2019.

Please click the image below to view the full triptych. Alt text is available.

Translated into English by Alan Bern. "L'infinto" by Giacomo Leopardi. In public domain. Infinitudes Teno's thought Leopard's hill A thick child's finger measures the endless lines between the hatches on the wood rule, dizzy from counting in another language. Later, shorn sheep jumped the trimmed hedge, landing back, lambs again, pranced off on a measured rack toward a deeply colored sun, rising or falling, dark enclosing the child like a lid. The Infinite Always dear to me this solitary hill and this thicket that screens out much of the view of the farthest horizon. But sitting and gazing out, I frame in my mind endless spaces beyond and silences that surpass anything human, and a deep stillness; there for a single beat the heart is not afraid And as the wind comes murmuring among these plants, I begin to compare that infinite silence to this voice: and recollect eternity and the dead seasons past and the present one alive before me. and her sound. So in this immensity my thinking goes under and sinks and this ship going down is sweet to me in this sca.
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"L'infinito" by Giacomo Leopardi

Translated into English by Alan Bern.

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Alan Bern, a recently retired children’s librarian, is a poet, storywriter, and photographer with two books of poetry from Fithian Press: No no the saddest (2004) and Waterwalking in Berkeley (2007). His third book of poetry, greater distance (2015), was published by his press, Lines & Faces, a fine press and publisher specializing in illustrated poetry broadsides, collaborating with the artist/printer Robert Woods, linesandfaces.com. IN THE PACE OF THE PATH is Alan’s first full-length hybrid of poetry, prose, and photos, forthcoming from UnCollected Press. Recent awards include: Winner, Saw Palm Poetry Contest (2022); Flash Fiction Finalist, Ekphrastic Sex (2021); and Winner, Littoral Press Poetry Prize (2015). Recent and upcoming writing and photo work in: Haunted Waters Press, Feral, DarkWinter Literary Magazine, and swifts & slows: a quarterly of crosscrossings. Alan is also a published/exhibited photographer and a performer with dancer/choreographer Lucinda Weaver as PACES and with musicians from Composing Together.

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