No cenário da poesia inglesa Dorothy Wordsworth ( 1771-1885), irmã do famoso poeta romântico William Wordsworth, pode ser considerada uma espécie de patinho feio da literatura britânica. Afinal, nunca foi ou quiz fama e, de acordo com o biógrafo Richard Cavendish, não passou de "uma névoa em aprofundamento da senilidade". Nunca quiz ser uma literata e, justamente por isso, nos expõem involuntariamente, com máxima precisão, a marginalidade da mulher e do feminino na literatura da época. Sua obra nos chegou, inclusive à sombra da literatura do irmão que lhe consagrou o poema Abbey Tintern:
FIVE years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur. -- Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,
That on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
'Mid groves and copses. Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines
Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms,
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees!
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods,
Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire
The Hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms,
Through a long absence, have not been to me
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye:
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind,
With tranquil restoration: -- feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered, acts
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened: -- that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on, --
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.
If this
Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft --
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world,
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart --
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods,
How often has my spirit turned to thee!
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought,
With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again:
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope,
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first
I came among these hills; when like a roe
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,
Wherever nature led: more like a man
Flying from something that he dreads, than one
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days,
And their glad animal movements all gone by)
To me was all in all. -- I cannot paint
What then I was. The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite; a feeling and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, nor any interest
Unborrowed from the eye. -- That time is past,
And all its aching joys are now no more,
And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur, other gifts
Have followed; for such loss, I would believe,
Abundant recompence. For I have learned
To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still
A lover of the meadows and the woods,
And mountains; and of all that we behold
From this green earth; of all the mighty world
Of eye, and ear, -- both what they half create,
And what perceive; well pleased to recognise
In nature and the language of the sense,
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul
Of all my moral being.
Nor perchance,
If I were not thus taught, should I the more
Suffer my genial spirits to decay:
For thou art with me here upon the banks
Of this fair river; thou my dearest Friend,
My dear, dear Friend; and in thy voice I catch
The language of my former heart, and read
My former pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once,
My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make,
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to lead
From joy to joy: for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues,
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men,
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;
And let the misty mountain-winds be free
To blow against thee: and, in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure; when thy mind
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh! then,
If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,
Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts
Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,
And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance --
If I should be where I no more can hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams
Of past existence -- wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream
We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came
Unwearied in that service: rather say
With warmer love -- oh! with far deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget,
That after many wanderings, many years
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs,
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake!
By William Wordsworth (1770-1850).
[Composed A Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey,
On Revisiting The Banks Of The Wye
During A Tour. July 13, 1798.]
Tradução:
Cinco anos à passaram, cinco Verões
e cinco Invernos longos! E outra vez
ouço estas águas que dos montes rolam
com tão doce murmúrio. Tomo a ver
estas altas escarpas majestosas
que no isolado matagal imprimem
ideias de mais funda solidão.
E à paz do céu eu ligo esta paisagem.
O dia me voltou em que repouso
uma vez mais à sombra do sicômoro,
e vejo desenhados os cultivos,
e os tufos do pomar que ainda imaturo
nesta estação do ano é verde, e não
se distingue dos bosques, nem perturba
o verde da paisagem. Ainda outra vez
contemplo as sebes, indistintas já,
porque cresceram bravas; e as herdades
verdes até ao limiar das portas;
e entre o arvoredo os ascendentes fumos!
Alguns são tão incertos, como se
fossem de vagabundos pelos bosques
ou de caverna de eremita aonde
junto do fogo el' esteja.
Esta beleza,
na longa ausência, nunca foi pra mim
como paisagem na Visão de um cego:
mas, amiúde, em quartos solitários
ou nas cidades agitadas, eu,
em horas de amargura, lhes devi
no sangue e no meu peito sensações
que entram às vezes no mais puro de alma
num repousar tranquilo. E sentimentos
de prazer não-lembrado, quais, talvez,
poder não pouco é que hão-de ter naquela
parte melhor da vida do homem justo:
breves, sem nome, não-lembrados actos
de bondade ou de amor.. Nem menos, creio,
ainda lhes devo mais sublime dádiva,
um estado de alma em bem-aventurança
em que a pesada carga do mistério,
em que a opressão, que nos esmaga e gasta,
do não-inteligível deste mundo,
se toma leve: esse sereno estado
em que Os afectos nos conduzem suaves-
até que, o respirar em nosso corpo
e o movimento de correr o sangue
quase que suspendidos, dorme o corpo
e se transforma em palpitar de uma alma:
enquanto um olhar, aquietado pelo
fundo poder de alegres harmonias,
nos mostra a vida interior das coisas.
Se uma vã crença isto só for.. mas quanto -
em trevas ou por entre as várias formas
de um triste dia, quando o anseio inútil
e a febre deste mundo mais pesaram
no coração que bate, oh, quantas vezes
em espírito, voltei às tuas margens,
silvestre rio!, que vagueias por
bosques tão verdes - quanto a ti voltei!
E Ora, em relance de idear quase extinto,
num reconhecimento vago e frágil
e algo também de urna tristeza ambígua,
a paisagem do espírito renasce:
enquanto estou aqui, não só no senso
do presente prazer, mas na confiança
que neste instante o alimento e a vida
no futuro não faltam. O que ouso esperar
sem dúvida diverso do que eu era,
quando andei nestes montes qual cabrito
saltava nas encostas, Pelas margens
de fundos rios e torrentes frias,
por onde a Natureza me levasse:
mais como aquele que foge do que teme
que quem procura o que ama. A Natureza
(os mais rudes prazeres da juventude
e a alegria animal do movimento,
agora já perdidos) para mim
era tudo. Não posso descrever
o que por mim eu era. A catarata
de ecos me fascinava: e a escarpa abrupta,
as montanhas, e os bosques mais sombrios,
as suas cores e formas então eram
como um desejo: sentimento e amor
não precisando mais remoto encanto
que o pensamento empreste, ou outro interesse
mais que o do próprio olhar. Mas esse tempo
passado é já, com seu prazer que doía,
suas vertigens de êxtase. Não me cabe
chorar ou lamentar, pois outros gozos
vieram, para tal perda, quero crer,
compensação bastante. É que aprendi
a ver a Natureza, não qual via
com juvenil descuido; mas ouvindo
a triste música da humanidade,
nem áspera, nem dura, poderosa
para nos aquietar. Tenho sentido
uma presença a perturbar-me alegre
com mais altas ideias: um sublime
senso de algo mais fundamente infuso,
cuja morada é a luz dos sois poentes,
do oceano a curva, o ar que nos rodeia,
o céu azul, e o pensamento humano:
um movimento, um espírito, que impele
tudo o que pensa, tudo o que é pensado,
e rola em quanto existe. Sou, portanto,
o amante ainda de montanhas, prados,
e bosques, e de tudo quanto vemos
na verde terra, e também todo o mundo
que ver e ouvir em parte criam e é
o que apercebem: e de aceitar feliz,
na Natureza e na sensual linguagem,
urna âncora do puro pensamento,
guia do que o meu peito sente,
e a alma do meu inteiro ser moral.
