Silvia, do you still remember
That time in your mortal life
When beauty shone
In your coy laughing eyes
And you, happy and thoughtful
Were on the threshold of youth?
The quiet rooms
The streets around
Sang with your eternal song
Sitting contented, intent
On your woman's work
Vague thoughts of the future
Filled your mind, the days
In our scented May
Sometimes I would put aside
My important wearisome studies
On which I used to spend the most part
Of my youthful days
And from the varanda of my father's house
I would strain to hear the sound of your voice
To see your swift fingers
Run over the wearisome cloth
I'd look at the serene sky
The sun drenched paths and gardens
Over the distant sea, over the mountains near
Mortal tongue cannot tell
What joy filled my breast.
What sweet thoughts
What hopes filled our hearts, O my Silvia!
How wonderful did human life
And destiny appear to us then!
When I think of all our hopes
Bitter and grief-stricken
My pain weighs upon me
As once again I suffer my misfortune
O Nature! O Nature!
Why do you not give now
What you promised then?
Why do you deceive your children so?
You perished like the grass that withers in winter
Attacked and defeated by a hidden disease
You died, my dearest. You did not see
The flowering of your years
Your heart was never flattered
By sweet praise or a head of fine black hair
And shy loving glances.
On the feast days your girlfriends
Never gossiped with you about love.
With you my sweetest hopes
Died. Destiny
Has denied me too
The years of youth. Ah, how!
How is it that you are gone
My hope that I weep over
My dear companion of youth?
What has become of our world? The pleasures
The love, the plans, the dreams
That we talked about so often together.
What fate lies before us?
When reality appeared,
You, poor dear, you fell.
From afar you show me the way to cold death
And the unknown tomb.
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