TESTO DEL LIED

"Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!"
di Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)


Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!



Bird thou never wert -


That from Heaven or near itor near it



Pourest thy full heart
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.




Higher still and higher



From the earth thou springest,


Like a cloud of fire;



The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.




In the golden lightning


Of the sunken sun,


O'er which clouds are bright'ning,


Thou dost float and run,
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.




The pale purple even



Melts around thy flight;


Like a star of Heaven,



In the broad daylight
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight -




Keen as are the arrows



Of that silver sphere


Whose intense lamp narrows



In the white dawn clear,
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.




All the earth and air


With thy voice is loud,


As, when night is bare,



From one lonely cloud
The moon rains out her beams, and Heaven is overflowed.




What thou art we know not;



What is most like thee?


From rainbow clouds there flow not



Drops so bright to see,
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody: -




Like a Poet hidden



In the light of thought,


Singing hymns unbidden,



Till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not:




Like a high-born maiden



In a palace-tower,


Soothing her love-laden



Soul in secret hour
With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower:




Like a glow-worm golden



In a dell of dew,


Scattering unbeholden



Its arial hue
Among the flowers and grass which screen it from the view:




Like a rose embowered



In its own green leaves,


By warm winds deflowered,



Till the scent it gives
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-wingd thieves:




Sound of vernal showers



On the twinkling grass,


Rain-awakened flowers -



All that ever was
Joyous and clear and fresh - thy music doth surpass.




Teach us, Sprite or Bird,



What sweet thoughts are thine:



I have never heard



Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.





Chorus hymeneal,



Or triumphal chant,


Matched with thine would be all



but an empty vaunt -
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want.




What objects are the fountains



Of thy happy strain?


What fields, or waves, or mountains?



What shapes of sky or plain?
What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?





With thy clear keen joyance



Languor cannot be:



Shadow of annoyance



Never came near thee:
Thou lovest, but ne'er knew love's sad satiety.





Waking or asleep,



Thou of death must deem



Things more true and deep



Than we mortals dream,
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?





We look before and after,



And pine for what is not:



Our sincerest laughter



With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.





Yet, if we could scorn



Hate and pride and fear,



If we were things born



Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.





Better than all measures



Of delightful sound,



Better than all treasures



That in books are found,
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!





Teach me half the gladness



That thy brain must know;



Such harmonious madness



From my lips would flow,
The world should listen then, as I am listening now.