Ada Negri

Ada Negri Poems

Ada Negri Biography

Ada Negri (February 3, 1870 - January 11, 1945) was an Italian poet. She was born in Lodi into an artisan family to Giuseppe Negri, and his wife Vittoria Cornalba, and became a village school-teacher. Her first book of poems, Tempeste (1891), tells the helpless tragedy of the forsaken poor, in words of vehement beauty. Her second volume of lyrics, Fatalità, confirmed her reputation as a poet, and led to her appointment to the normal school at Milan; but her later verse, while striking in its sincerity, has been thought to suffer from a tendency to repetition and consequent mannerism. Ada Negri was a frequent visitor to Laglio in Lake Como, where she wrote her only novel "Stella Mattutina" (Morning Star) published in 1921. She became the first woman member of the Italian Academy in 1940.)

The Best Poem Of Ada Negri

The Waves Flow On

BETWEEN the rugged banks with steady force
The waves flow weeping on. The leaden sky
Is listening. Not a smile there is on high,
No breath stirs in the night. Along their course

The waves flow weeping on. Upon their breast
In sadness grave they carry down the vale
The lifeless body of a lovely, pale,
Unhappy girl who in their depth sought rest.

The waves flow weeping on — in this lament
The echo rings of a strange mystery,
The human cry, the sobs of misery
Of a wild desperate love — defeated — spent.

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