The Poetry Of Rainer Maria Rilke

IN THE BEGINNING

Ever since those wondrous days of Creation
our Lord God sleeps: we are His sleep.
And He accepted this in His indulgence,
resigned to rest among the distant stars.

Our actions stopped Him from reacting,
for His fist-tight hand is numbed by sleep,
and the times brought in the age of heroes
during which our dark hearts plundered Him.

Sometimes He appears as if tormented,
and His body jerks as if plagued by pain;
but these spells are always outweighed by the
number of His countless other worlds.

SACRIFICE

How my body blooms from every vein
more fragrantly, since you appeard to me;
look, I walk slimmer now and straighter,
and all you do is wait-:who are you then?

Look: I feel how I'm moving away,
how I'm shedding my old life, leaf by leaf.
Only your smile spreads like sheer stars
over you and, soon now, over me.

Whatever shines through my childhood years
still nameless and gleaming like water,
I will name after you at the altar,
which is blazing brightly from your hair
and braided gently with your breasts.

SENSE OF SOMETHING COMING

I am like a flag in the center of open space.
I sense ahead the wind which is coming, and must live
it through.
while the things of the world still do not move:
the doors still close softly, and the chimneys are full
of silence,
the windows do not rattle yet, and the dust still lies down.

I already know the storm, and I am troubled as the sea.
I leap out, and fall back,
and throw myself out, and am absolutely alone
in the great storm.

LOVE SONG

When my soul touches yours a great chord sings!

How shall I tune it then to other things?

O! That some spot in darkness could be found

That does not vibrate whene'er your depths sound.

But everything that touches you and me

Welds us as played strings sound one melody.

Where is the instrument whence the sounds flow?

And whose the master-hand that holds the bow?

O! Sweet song

was like that--your light, small breasts you bore,

And his blood's current coursed like the wild sea.

That god - who was the wanderer, the slim

Despoiler of fair women; he - the wise,

But sweet and glowing as your thoughts of him

Who cast a shadow over your young limb

While bending like your arched brows o'er your eyes.

THE TOMB OF A YOUNG GIRL

We still remember! The same as of yore

All that has happened once again must be.

As grows a lemon-tree upon the shore

SYMBOLS

From infinite longings finite deeds rise

As fountains spring toward far-off glowing skies,

But rushing swiftly upward weakly bend

And trembling from their lack of power descend

So through the falling torrent of our fears

Our joyous force leaps like these dancing tears.

DEATH

Before us great Death stands

Our fate held close within his quiet hands.

When with proud joy we lift Life's red wine

To drink deep of the mystic shining cup

And ecstasy through all our being leaps--

Death bows his head and weeps.