Guido Gozzano – La differenza / The difference

Camille Pissarro, Peasant Woman Watching the Geese, 1890

I think and think again: — What thinks the goose
on the canal bank croaking with all her might?
She seems happy! In the winter twilight
stretching her neck out jubilant and raucous.
She jumps, dives, flutters her gay wings loose,
and surely doesn’t dream how short her flight
and surely doesn’t dream of Christmas night 
or of the cook’s bright weapons and their use.
O gosling, my sister, most candid mate,
death does not exist, you teach us all:
only as he thought did man begin to die.
But you don’t think. Yours is a happy fate!
Since to be fried is not sad at all,
what’s sad is the thought that we must fry.

(Transl. by Carlo L. Golino)

Penso e ripenso: – che mai pensa l’oca
gracidante alla riva del canale?
Pare felice! Al vespero invernale
protende il collo, giubilando roca.
Salta starnazza si rituffa gioca:
né certo sogna d’essere mortale
né certo sogna il prossimo Natale
né l’armi corruscanti della cuoca.
– O papera, mia candida sorella,
tu insegni che la morte non esiste:
solo si muore da che s’è pensato.
Ma tu non pensi. La tua sorte è bella!
Ché l’esser cucinato non è triste,
triste è il pensare d’esser cucinato.