Poems, passage 136

Let your flute be still and your soul float through Waves of sound formless as waves of the sea, For here your song lived and it wisely grew Before it was forced into melody.

Poems, passage 126

No vision of exotic southern countries, No dancing women, supple, brown and tall Whirling from out their falling draperies To melodies that beat a fierce mad call;

Poems, passage 211

Her mouth is like the mouth of a fine bust That cannot utter sound, nor breathe, nor kiss, But that had once from Life received all this Which shaped its subtle curves, and ever must From fullness of past knowledge dwell alone, A thing apart, a parable in stone.

Poems, passage 111

Call me, Beloved! Call aloud to me! Thy bride her vigil at the window keeps; The evening wanes to dusk, the dimness creeps Down empty alleys of the old plane-tree.

Poems, passage 91

Kings in old legends seem Like mountains rising in the evening light. They blind all with their gleam, Their loins encircled are by girdles bright, Their robes are edged with bands Of precious stones--the rarest earth affords-- With richly jeweled hands They hold their slender, shining, naked swords.

Poems, passage 150

Those times: the times when I was quite alone By memories wrapt that whispered to me low, My silence was the quiet of a stone Over which rippling murmuring waters flow.

Poems, passage 112

O! Let thy voice enfold me close about, Or from this dark house, lonely and remote, Through deep blue gardens where gray shadows float I will pour forth my soul with hands stretched out ...

Poems, passage 190

But though my vigil constantly I keep My God is dark--like woven texture flowing, A hundred drinking roots, all intertwined; I only know that from His warmth I'm growing. More I know not: my roots lie hidden deep My branches only are swayed by the wind.

Poems, passage 31

To this sphere of relaxation and restfulness in which the objects are static and are changed only as the surrounding atmosphere affects them, the second phase in the poet's development adds another element, which later was to grow into dimensions so powerful, so violently breaking beyond the limitations of simple expression in words that it could only find its satisfaction in a dithyrambic hymn to the work of the great plastic artist of our time, to the creations of Auguste Rodin. This second element is that which the French sculptor in a different medium has carried to perfection. It is the element of gesture, of dramatic movement.

Poems, passage 27

The second book of poems appeared two years later and like the first volume _Traumgekroent_ is full of the music that is reminiscent of the mild melancholy of the Bohemian folk-songs, in whose gentle rhythms the barbaric strength of the race seems to be lulled to rest as the waves of a far-away tumultuous sea gently lap the shore. The themes of _Traumgekroent_ are extended somewhat beyond the immediate environment of Prague and some of the most beautiful poems are luminous pictures of villages hidden in the snowy blossoming of May and June, out of which rises here and there the solitary soft voice of a boy or girl singing. In these first two volumes the poet is satisfied with painting in words, full of sonorous beauty, the surrounding world. From this period dates the small poem _Evening_, which seems to have been sketched by a Japanese painter, so clear and colourful is its texture, so precious and precise are its outlines.

Poems, passage 78

I am still so blossoming, so young. How shall I go on tiptoe From childhood to Annunciation Through the dim twilight Into thy Garden.

Poems, passage 127

No sound of songs that from the hot blood rise, No langorous, stretching, dusky, velvet maids Flashing like gleaming weapon their bright eyes, No swift, wild thrill the quickening blood pervades.

Poems, passage 36

Mention should be made of some prose writings which Rilke published in the year 1898 and shortly afterward. They are _Two Stories of Prague_, _The Touch of Life_ and _The Last_; three volumes of short stories; a two-act drama, _The Daily Life_, points to a strong Maeterlinck influence, and finally _Stories of God_. With both beauty of detail and problematic interest, the short stories show an incoherence of treatment and a lack of dramatic co-ordination easily conceivable in a poet who is essentially lyrical and who at that time had not mastered the means of technique to give to his characters the clear chiselling of the epic form.

Poems, passage 146

The wind through the white garments softly stirred And they grew vari-coloured in each fold And each fold hidden blossoms seemed to hold And flowers and stars and fluting notes of bird, And dim, quaint figures shimmering like gold Seemed to come forth from distant myths of old.

Poems, passage 124

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.

Poems, passage 148

It was as though garlands crowned everything And all things were touched softly by the sun; And many windows opened one by one And the light trembled on them glistening.

Poems, passage 85

Whoever wanders somewhere in the world Wanders in vain in the world Wanders to me.

Poems, passage 161

Oh! All things are long passed away and far. A light is shining but the distant star From which it still comes to me has been dead A thousand years ... In the dim phantom boat That glided past some ghastly thing was said. A clock just struck within some house remote. Which house?--I long to still my beating heart. Beneath the sky's vast dome I long to pray ... Of all the stars there must be far away A single star which still exists apart. And I believe that I should know the one Which has alone endured and which alone Like a white City that all space commands At the ray's end in the high heaven stands.

Poems, passage 79

I am like a flag unfurled in space, I scent the oncoming winds and must bend with them, While the things beneath are not yet stirring, While doors close gently and there is silence in the chimneys And the windows do not yet tremble and the dust is still heavy-- Then I feel the storm and am vibrant like the sea And expand and withdraw into myself And thrust myself forth and am alone in the great storm.

Poems, passage 156

And then she weeps: I was--a child-- Who were you then, Marie? Know you that I was no man's child, Poor and in rags--said she.

Poems, passage 200

But I would comprehend Thee As the wide Earth unfolds Thee. Thou growest with my maturity, Thou Art in calm and storm.

Poems, passage 131

Expectant and waiting you muse On the great rare thing which alone To enhance your life you would choose: The awakening of the stone, The deeps where yourself you would lose.

Poems, passage 30

Up to the time of the publication of these volumes, Rilke's poems possessed a quietude, a stillness suggested in the straight unbroken yet delicate lines of the picture which he portrays and in the soft, almost unpulsating rhythm of his words. The approach of evening or nightfall, the coming of dawn, the change of the seasons, the slow changes of light into darkness and of darkness into light, in short, the most silent yet greatest metamorphoses in the external aspects of nature form the contents of many of these first poems. The inanimate object and the living creature in nature are not seen in the sharp contours of their isolation; they are viewed and interpreted in the atmosphere that surrounds them, in which they are enwrapped and so densely veiled that the outlines are only dimly visible, be that atmosphere the mystic grey of northern twilight or the dark velvety blue of southern summer nights. In _Advent_, the experience of the atmosphere becomes an experience in his innermost soul and, therefore, all things become of value to him only in so far as they partake of the atmosphere, as they are seen in a peculiar air and distance. This first phase in Rilke's work may be defined as the phase of reposeful nature.

Poems, passage 46

With _Das Buch der Bilder_ the dream is ended, the veil of mist is lifted and before us are revealed pictures and images that rise before our eyes in clear colourful contours. Whether the poet conjures from the depths of myth _The Kings in Legends_, or whether we read from _The Chronicle of a Monk_ the awe-inspiring description of _The Last Judgment Day_, or whether in Paris on a Palm Sunday we see _The Maidens at Confirmation_, the pictures presented stand out with the clearness and finality of the typical.

Poems, passage 70

Rilke sees in Rodin the dominant personification in our age of the "power of servitude in all nature." For this reason the book on Rodin is far more than a purely aesthetic valuation of the sculptor's work; Rilke traces throughout the book the strongly ethical principle which works itself out in every creative act in the realm of art. This grasp of the deeper significance of all art gives to the book on Rodin its well-nigh religious aspect of thought and its hymnlike rhythm of expression. He begins: "Rodin was solitary before fame came to him, and afterward he became perhaps still more solitary. For fame is ultimately but the summary of all misunderstandings that crystallize about a new name." And he sums up this one man's greatness: "Sometime it will be realized what has made this great artist so supreme. He was a worker whose only desire was to penetrate with all his forces into the humble and the difficult significance of his tool. Therein lay a certain renunciation of life but in just this renunciation lay his triumph--for Life entered into his work."

Poems, passage 175

Tense and still like one who to sing must rise Before a throng on a festal night She lifted her head, and her bright glad eyes Were like pools which reflected light.

Poems, passage 214

A watcher of Thy spaces make me, Make me a listener at Thy stone, Give to me vision and then wake me Upon Thy oceans all alone. Thy rivers' courses let me follow Where they leap the crags in their flight And where at dusk in caverns hollow They croon to music of the night. Send me far into Thy barren land Where the snow clouds the wild wind drives, Where monasteries like gray shrouds stand-- August symbols of unlived lives. There pilgrims climb slowly one by one, And behind them a blind man goes: With him I will walk till day is done Up the pathway that no one knows ...

Poems, passage 21

The background against which the figure of Rainer Maria Rilke is silhouetted is so varied, the influences which have entered into his life are so manifold, that a study of his work, however slight, must needs take into consideration the elements through which this poet has matured into a great master.

Poems, passage 129

The beasts in cages much more loyal are, Restlessly pacing, pacing to and fro, Dreaming of countries beckoning from afar, Lands where they roamed in days of long ago.

Poems, passage 5

_The Book of Pictures:_ Presaging Autumn Silent Hour The Angels Solitude Kings in Legends The Knight The Boy Initiation The Neighbour Song of the Statue Maidens I Maidens II The Bride Autumnal Day Moonlight Night In April Memories of a Childhood Death The Ashantee Remembrance Music Maiden Melancholy Maidens at Confirmation The Woman who Loves Pont du Carrousel Madness Lament Symbols

Poems, passage 57

"By day Thou art the Legend and the Dream That like a whisper floats about all men, The deep and brooding stillnesses which seem, After the hour has struck, to close again. And when the day with drowsy gesture bends And sinks to sleep beneath the evening skies, As from each roof a tower of smoke ascends So does Thy Realm, my God, around me rise."

Poems, passage 90

Solitude is like a rain That from the sea at dusk begins to rise; It floats remote across the far-off plain Upward into its dwelling-place, the skies, Then o'er the town it slowly sinks again. Like rain it softly falls at that dim hour When ghostly lanes turn toward the shadowy morn; When bodies weighed with satiate passion's power Sad, disappointed from each other turn; When men with quiet hatred burning deep Together in a common bed must sleep-- Through the gray, phantom shadows of the dawn Lo! Solitude floats down the river wan ...

Poems, passage 188

Many have painted her. But there was one Who drew his radiant colours from the sun. Mysteriously glowing through a background dim When he was suffering she came to him, And all the heavy pain within his heart Rose in his hands and stole into his art. His canvas is the beautiful bright veil Through which her sorrow shines. There where the Texture o'er her sad lips is closely drawn A trembling smile softly begins to dawn ... Though angels with seven candles light the place You cannot read the secret of her face.

Poems, passage 144

Like resurrection were the garments white The wreathed procession walked through trees arched wide Into the church, as cool as silk inside, With long aisles of tall candles flaming bright: The lights all shone like jewels rich and rare To solemn eyes that watched them gleam and flare.

Poems, passage 88

They all resemble one another, In God's garden they are silent Like many, many intervals In His mighty melody.

Poems, passage 107

Within his garden let him wait alone Where benches stand expectant in the shade Within the chamber where the lyre was played Where he received you as the eternal One.

Poems, passage 73

Rilke has lived deeply; he has absorbed into his artistic and spiritual consciousness many of the supreme values of our time. His art holds the mystic depth of the Slav, the musical strength of the German, and the visual clarity of the Latin. As artist, he has felt life to be sacred, and as a priest, he has brought to its altar many offerings.

Poems, passage 67

More vital than the influence of the personalities and the art treasures of the countries which Rilke visited and more potent in its effect upon his creations, like a great sun over the most fruitful years of his life, stands the towering personality of Auguste Rodin. The _New Poems_ bear the dedication: "A mon grand ami, Auguste Rodin," indicating the twofold influence which the French sculptor wielded over the poet, that of a friend and that of an artist.

Poems, passage 121

The room betrayed the mother--so she felt-- She kissed her boy and questioned "Are you here?" And with a gesture that he held most dear Down for a moment by his side she knelt.

Poems, passage 16

Poetry is reality's essence visioned and made manifest by one endowed with a perception acutely sensitive to sound, form, and colour, and gifted with a power to shape into rhythmic and rhymed verbal symbols the reaction to Life's phenomena. The poet moulds that which appears evanescent and ephemeral in image and in mood into everlasting values. In this act of creation he serves eternity.

Poems, passage 164

There is as yet no shadow in his glance, Too cool his temples for the laurel's glow; But later o'er those marble brows, perchance, A rose-garden with bushes tall will grow,

Poems, passage 84

Whoever laughs somewhere out in the night Laughs without cause in the night Laughs at me.

Poems, passage 44

In the first decade of the new century Rilke reached the height of his art and with a few exceptions the poems represented in this volume are selected from the poems which were published between the years 1900 and 1908. The ascent toward the acme of Rilke's art after the year 1900 is as rapid as it is precipitous. Only a few years previous we read in Advent:

Poems, passage 33

The gesture, the movement begins in _Advent_ and _Celebration_ to disturb the stillness prevailing in the first two volumes of poems. Even here it is only gentle and shy at first like the stirring of a breath of wind over a quiet sea; and gentle beings make this first gesture, children and young women at play, singing, dancing or at prayer.

Poems, passage 177

As a lit match first flickers in the hands Before it flames, and darts out from all sides Bright, twitching tongues, so, ringed by growing bands Of spectators--she, quivering, glowing stands Poised tensely for the dance--then forward glides

Poems, passage 86

Whoever dies somewhere in the world Dies without cause in the world Looks at me.

Poems, passage 204

In another house was the one who had died, Who still sat at table and drank from the glass And ever within the walls did abide-- For out of the house he could no more pass. And his children set forth to seek for the spot Where stands the great Church which he forgot.

Poems, passage 195

Out of my dark hours wisdom dawns apace, Infinite Life unrolls its boundless space ...

Poems, passage 1

Produced by Andrea Ball and Marc D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made available by the Internet Archive)

Poems, passage 122

Toward the piano they both shyly glanced For she would sing to him on many a night, And the child seated in the fading light Would listen strangely as if half entranced,