Le cinque anatre [English translation]

Five ducks are flying southwards.

Winter has come well before time.

Five ducks you will see flying

against a veiled sun.

Not a noise on the taiga:

just a flash, one instant and a cruel bite.

Four ducks you will see flying,

and a prey falling down.

Four ducks are flying southwards.

How far is the land that used to feed them?

How far the land that will feed them now?

And by now winter is coming.

A day seems like it never ends.

White, snow whistles and blinds in the wind.

Only three ducks you will see flying,

a heavy flight by now.

What they are thinking of, no one shall know:

the winter and the big plains are thinking of nothing,

and likewise the frost that will break the soil

with a lasting cry.

And the flock flies, flies southwards.

Nothing surrounds them now, but sleep and hunger.

Only two ducks you will see flying

towards the southern lands now appearing.

Five ducks flew southwards.

One alone we might see coming...

But its flight is bound to mean

flight was to be.

• Artist:Francesco Guccini