After Eugenio Montale — Spesso il male di vivere ho incontrato
Often, it’s life’s evils that I’ve met:
the blocked-up gurgling stream, frustrated in its course;
a leaf in summer, shrivelled in the heat;
the awful stillness of a fallen horse.
The good in life eluded me, unless it were
to know the wonder in divine indifference:
this statue, upright in the midday somnolence;
that cloud; that falcon in the upper air.