> newer, safer, nimble
"newer" is hopefully a non-goal.
Unfortunately, an option that is both safer and nimble doesn't appear to exist. I'm still hopeful, but at the moment it looks like rust is our future. A fate only marginally better than C++.
Everything out there is nimbler than C++. So you only have to select for safer to get those, and anything with managed memory and Rust are safer. (Not an exclusive set, but you'll need to actually evaluate other options.)