The Angel

With a slight nod he dismisses forever
all that sets limits and obliges;
for the Eternal Coming fills his heart-
in wide orbits, huge, uplifted.

The deep heavens stand before him full of shapes,
and each may call to him: come, know me-.
Give his light hands nothing of your burdens
to hold. Else they will come to you

at night, to test you with a fiercer grip,
and go like some raging thing through your house
and seize you as though they'd created you
and broken you out of your mold.

13 September

Sometimes to someone lonely there comes something that works as a wondrous balm. It is not a sound, not a splendor, not even a voice. It is the smile of long-lost women--a smile that, like the light of perished stars, is still on its way.

The Bride

7 September 1900

I have felt her in this house,
The blond bride, who long languished here.
All hours sing with her voice
and all sounds move with her gait.

The objects, which had to serve me daily,
grew downcast whenever I approached,
and they yearned for someone more intuitive
with whom their simplicity could commune.

Nothing in the house declared her presence,
yet everything said "it's not for you,"
and when at dusk I wandered through long hallways,
all mirros begged for her soft image.-

(Excerpt from Diaries of a young poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, Translated by Edward Snow & Michael Winkler. Published by W. W. Norton & Company, 1998)

Sonnets to Orpheus, Part II, 9

Don't boast, you men of justice, that the rack is obsolescent
and that iron no longer shackles necks.
No heart's been lightened, not one -, because a willed
spasm of mercy twists you more tenderly.

What it's received through the ages. the scaffold
gives back - the way children treat their toys
from past birthdays. Into the pure, the high,
the gatelike open heart, the god of true mercy

would step differently. Gigantic he'd come,
cutting swaths of radiance, as is the wont of gods.
More than a wind for the great confident ships.

Not less than the secret subtle conciousness
that wins us silently inside

like the quietly playing child of an infinite pairing.

Sonnets to Orpheus, Part I, 9

Only he who has also raised
his lyre among shadows
may find his way back
to infinite praise.

Only he who has eaten with the dead
from their strores of poppy
will never again lose
the softest chord.

And though the pool's refection
often blurs us:
Know the image.

Only in the doube realm
do the voices become
eternal and mild.

Sonnets to Orpheus, Part II, 12, Muzot, Feb.15-17, 1922

Will transformation. Be inspired by the flame

where a thing made of Change conceals itself,
this informing spirit, master of all that's earthly,
loves nothing more than the moment of turning.
What's heartset on survival is already stony;

how safe is it, hid in its innocuous gray?
Look out, from afar a far harder hardness warns it:
feel the approach of a hammer held high.

Whoever flows forth from himself like a freshet, Knowledge
will acknowledge,

and lead him, entranced, through her wondrous world,
where endings are often beginnings and beginnings ends.

Every fortune-favored space you wander through, astonished,
is the child or the grandchild of Change. Even Daphne
as she leafs into laurel, wants to feel you become wind.

Sonnets to Orpheus, Part II, 29, Feb.19-23

Silent friend of many distances, feel
how your breath enlarges space.

From the dark tower let your bell peal.

Whatever feeds upon your face

grows strong from this offering.

Transform matter into mind.

What is the source of your deepest suffering?

If drinking is bitter, become wine.

In this limitless night, be the magical force

at the intersection of your senses,

the meaning of their intercourse.

And if what's earthly no longer knows you,

say to the unmoving earth: I flow.

To the rushing water speak: I stay.