
“Winter garden,
the moon thinned to a thread,
insects singing.”
Original Italian text:
Noi canteremo le grandi folle agitate dal lavoro, dal piacere o dalla sommossa: canteremo le maree multicolori e polifoniche delle rivoluzioni nelle capitali moderne; canteremo il vibrante fervore notturno degli arsenali e dei cantieri incendiati da violente lune elettriche; le stazioni ingorde, divoratrici di serpi che fumano; le officine appese alle nuvole pei contorti fili dei loro fumi; i ponti simili a ginnasti giganti che scavalcano i fiumi, balenanti al sole con un luccichio di coltelli; i piroscafi avventurosi che fiutano l'orizzonte, le locomotive dall'ampio petto, che scalpitano sulle rotaie, come enormi cavalli d'acciaio imbrigliati di tubi, e il volo scivolante degli aereoplani, la cui elica garrisce al vento come una bandiera e sembra applaudire come una folla entusiasta.
Source: 1900's, The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism' 1909, p. 52 : Last bullet-item in THE MANIFESTO OF FUTURISM
“Winter garden,
the moon thinned to a thread,
insects singing.”
“Singing let's go, the way shall better please.”
The Works of Publius Virgilius Maro (2nd ed. 1654), Virgil's Bucolicks
“They shall not live who have not tasted death.
They only sing who are struck dumb by God.”
"Poets"
Trees and Other Poems (1914)
Context: p>Vain is the chiming of forgotten bells
That the wind sways above a ruined shrine.
Vainer his voice in whom no longer dwells
Hunger that craves immortal Bread and Wine. Light songs we breathe that perish with our breath
Out of our lips that have not kissed the rod.
They shall not live who have not tasted death.
They only sing who are struck dumb by God.</p
Everyone
Song lyrics, Moondance (1970)
As quoted in Cosmos (1980) by Carl Sagan.
My Triumph, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
Context: Sweeter than any sung
My songs that found no tongue;
Nobler than any fact
My wish that failed of act.
Others shall sing the song,
Others shall right the wrong,—
Finish what I begin,
And all I fail of win.
1962, Rice University speech
Forgotten Home http://www.poetrysoup.com/famous/poem/21398/Forgotten_Home
From the poems written in English