Tra i pioppi soffia una leggera
brezza. Il cielo alle mie spalle e’ rosso
di fronte l’ ansia della sera
- e il tramonto – e la morte.

E vado stanco e impolverato
e dietro a me resta esitante
la giovinezza, china il capo
e non vuole più seguire la strada con me.

Hermann Hesse

Now for my last—let me look back a moment;
The slower fainter ticking of the clock is in me,
Exit, nightfall, and soon the heart-thud stopping.

Long have we lived, joy’d, caress’d together;
Delightful!—now separation—Good-bye my Fancy.

Yet let me not be too hasty,
Long indeed have we lived, slept, filter’d, become really blended
into one;
Then if we die we die together, (yes, we’ll remain one,)
If we go anywhere we’ll go together to meet what happens,
May-be we’ll be better off and blither, and learn something,
May-be it is yourself now really ushering me to the true songs, (who
knows?)
May-be it is you the mortal knob really undoing, turning—so now finally,
Good-bye—and hail! my Fancy.