Quiet friend who has come so far,feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,
what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.
In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.
And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.
Rainer Maria Rilke,
Sonnets to Orpheus, Part Two, Sonnet XXIX
(Translated by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows)
3 comments:
OMG this poem is incredible, and the accompanying picture just right. Is it a painting, Cate, or a photo?
Very,very powerful.
Rilke's poem is one of my lifelong favorites, and yes, the image is a photo - the dark water and the shadows cast by nearby stalks of pickerel weed make a lovely contrast.
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