di Geoffrey Hill
traduzione di Marco Fazzini
[Per chi non è caduto. Poesie scelte 1959-2006, luca sossella editore, Roma 2008.]
For the Unfallen [Per quelli che restano], 1959
The Guardians
The young, having risen early, had gone,
Some with excursions beyond the bay-mouth,
Some toward lakes, a fragile reflected sun.
Thunder-heads drift, awkwardly, from the south;
The old watch them. They have watched the safe
Packed harbours topple under sudden gales,
Great tides irrupt, yachts burn at the wharf
That on clean seas pitched their effective sails.
Thereare silences. These, too, they endure:
Soft comings-on; soft after-shocks of calm.
Quietly they wade the disturbed shore;
Gather the dead as the first dead scrape home.










