Naiad Quotes

“Pullulating in the dim woods—and gently
trembling—and dilating in the light,
the water ripples; and just now she veils her rite,
just now through all her pale veins she
shivers in discovering a little valley
of nuptials where there are yet in sight
the vestiges of corpses that in the delight
of love had entwined under Selene’s scrutiny.

Selene is dead; the Argives are dead;
their wedding beds—abandoned; in the sovereign stand
of the night’s silence the water’s tumults cease;
but still from time to time I think I hear ahead
the gurgling of an urn that a hand
pours invisibly in that peace.

(Trans. Michael Shindler)”
― Gabriele D'Annunzio