Time poems
/ page 374 of 792 /
Eve
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Look how she stands, high on the steep facade
of the cathedral, near the window-rose,
simply, holding in her hand the apple,
judged for all time as the guiltless-guilty
In The Beginning
© Rainer Maria Rilke
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.
The Apple Orchard
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Thus must it be, when willingly you strive
throughout a long and uncomplaining life,
committed to one goal: to give yourself!
And silently to grow and to bear fruit.
Self-Portrait
© Rainer Maria Rilke
This, as a coherent whole, only casually observed;
never as yet tried in suffering or succeeding,
held together for an enduring fulfillment,
yet so as if for times to come, out of these scattered things,
something serious and lasting were being planned.
Girl's Lament
© Rainer Maria Rilke
And I still imagined, that life
would always keep providing
for one to dwell on things within,
Am I within myself not in what's greatest?
Shall what's mine no longer soothe
and understand me as a child?
Song Of The Sea
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Timeless sea breezes,
that for aeons have
blown ancient rocks,
you are purest space
coming from afar...
Heartbeat
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Only mouths are we. Who sings the distant heart
which safely exists in the center of all things?
His giant heartbeat is diverted in us
into little pulses. And his giant grief
Growing Old
© Rainer Maria Rilke
In some summers there is so much fruit,
the peasants decide not to reap any more.
Not having reaped you, oh my days,
my nights, have I let the slow flames
of your lovely produce fall into ashes?
Going Blind
© Rainer Maria Rilke
She sat just like the others at the table.
But on second glance, she seemed to hold her cup
a little differently as she picked it up.
She smiled once. It was almost painful.
Duino Elegies: The First Elegy
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
To Music
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Music: breathing of statues. Perhaps:
silence of paintings. You language where all language
ends. You time
standing vertically on the motion of mortal hearts.
To Lou Andreas-Salome
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Memory won't suffice here: from those moments
there must be layers of pure existence
on my being's floor, a precipitate
from that immensely overfilled solution.
The Future
© Rainer Maria Rilke
The future: time's excuse
to frighten us; too vast
a project, too large a morsel
for the heart's mouth.
You, You Only, Exist
© Rainer Maria Rilke
To you I belong, however time may
wear me away. From you to you
I go commanded. In between
the garland is hanging in chance; but if you
take it up and up and up: look:
all becomes festival!
To Say Before Going To Sleep
© Rainer Maria Rilke
The clocks are striking, calling to eachother,
and one can see right to the edge of time.
Outside the house a strange man is afoot
and a strange dog barks, wakened from his sleep.
Beyond that there is silence.
Falling Stars
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Do you remember still the falling stars
that like swift horses through the heavens raced
and suddenly leaped across the hurdles
of our wishes--do you recall? And we
The Sisters
© Rainer Maria Rilke
Look how the same possibilities
unfold in their opposite demeanors,
as though one saw different ages
passing through two identical rooms.
The Panther
© Rainer Maria Rilke
His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars and behind the bars, no world.
To A Young Lady
© John Trumbull
From me, not famed for much goodnature,
Expect not compliment, but satire;
To draw your picture quite unable,
Instead of fact accept a Fable.
The Owl And The Sparrow
© John Trumbull
The grave Owl heard the weighty cause,
And humm'd and hah'd at every pause;
Then fix'd his looks in sapient plan,
Stretch'd forth one foot, and thus began.
