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I am, O Anxious One

Rainer Maria Rilke, Rainer Maria Rilke poetry, Secular or Eclectic, Secular or Eclectic poetry,  poetry, [TRADITION SUB2] poetry,  poetry by Rainer Maria Rilke
(1875 - 1926) Timeline

English version by
Stephen Mitchell

Original Language
German

Secular or Eclectic
20th Century

I am, O Anxious One. Don't you hear my voice
surging forth with all my earthly feelings?
They yearn so high that they have sprouted wings
and whitely fly in circles around your face.
My soul, dressed in silence, rises up
and stands alone before you: can't you see?
Don't you know that my prayer is growing ripe
upon your vision, as upon a tree?

If you are the dreamer, I am what you dream.
But when you want to wake, I am your wish,
and I grow strong with all magnificence
and turn myself into a star's vast silence
above the strange and distant city, Time.

 

 

-- from Ahead of All Parting: The Selected Poetry and Prose of Rainer Maria Rilke, Translated by Stephen Mitchell

Amazon.com

 

Themes

  Awakening
  Bower
  Garden
  Silence
  Sleep


Recommended Books


Ahead of All Parting: The Selected Poetry and Prose of Rainer Maria Rilke, Translated by Stephen Mitchell
The Best of Rilke: 72 Form-True Verse Translations, Translated by Walter W. Arndt
The Book of Hours: Prayers to a Lowly God, by Rainer Maria Rilke / Translated by Annemarie Kidder
Duino Elegies, by Rainer Maria Rilke / Translated by David Young
Engendering Inspiration: Visionary Strategies in Rilke, Lawrence, and H.D., by Helen Sword

More >>

 

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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are Copyright © 2002 - 2011 by Ivan M. Granger.
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