Giacomo Leopardi | Alla luna / To the moon, 1819

O graziosa luna, io mi rammento

Che, or volge l’anno, sovra questo colle

Io venia pien d’angoscia a rimirarti:

E tu pendevi allor su quella selva

Siccome or fai, che tutta la rischiari.

Caspar David Friedrich | The Dreamer, 1835 | The Hermitage, St. Petersburg

Ma nebuloso e tremulo dal pianto

Che mi sorgea sul ciglio, alle mie luci

Il tuo volto apparia, che travagliosa

Era mia vita: ed è, nè cangia stile,

O mia diletta luna. E pur mi giova

La ricordanza, e il noverar l’etate

Del mio dolore. Oh come grato occorre

Nel tempo giovanil, quando ancor lungo

La speme e breve ha la memoria il corso,

Il rimembrar delle passate cose,

Ancor che triste, e che l’affanno duri!

Stanislao Ferrazzi | Giacomo Leopardi, 1897

Giacomo Leopardi | To the moon

O lovely moon, how well do I recall

The time, - 'tis just a year - when up this hill

I came, in my distress, to gaze at thee:

And thou suspended wast o'er yonder grove,

As now thou art, which thou with light dost fill.

But stained with mist, and tremulous, appeared

Thy countenance to me, because my eyes

Were filled with tears, that could not be suppressed;

For, oh, my life was wretched, wearisome,

And _is_ so still, unchanged, beloved moon!

Caspar David Friedrich | Two men contemplating the Moon, 1825-1830 | Metropolitan Museum of Art

And yet this recollection pleases me,

This computation of my sorrow's age.

How pleasant is it, in the days of youth,

When hope a long career before it hath,

And memories are few, upon the past

To dwell, though sad, and though the sadness last!

René Magritte | A la rencontre du plaisir, 1962

Caspar David Friedrich | A Walk at Dusk, 1837-1840 | Getty Museum