Tuesday, January 4, 2011

You Who Never Arrived

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don’t even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of the next
moment. All the immense
images in me – the far-off, deeply-felt landscape,
cities, towers, and bridges, and unsuspected
turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods -
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house – , and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me.
Streets that I chanced upon, -
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and, startled,
gave back my too-sudden image. Who knows?
perhaps the same bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, seperate, in the evening…

Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by Stephen Mitchell

Image: 'Love in the Afternoon' - Andrew Wyeth 1992

19 comments:

roxanne s. sukhan said...

I love Rilke.

Lesley said...

Thanks Dianne, I read your answer to my question in your previous post. I hope you can reach a sense of acceptance and peace over this person..... or have some gorgeous guy come and sweep you off your feet! :D

puerileuwaite said...

It could always be worse. There's a vintage tune where the singer is trying to talk her guy out of sleeping in the subway.

darkfoam said...

well, i'll be ..
i thought you wrote this ..

dianne said...

Thank you dear tinkerbell , I love his works too, have you read "Letters to a Young Poet", so beautiful!

xoxoxo ♡

dianne said...

Thank you dear Lesley , for your kind wishes.
This man of whom I spoke I hope will always be my friend, I doubt very much that he would ever want any more than that from me - but that is fine, just knowing he is my friend will have to be enough and just knowing he is there gives me happiness in my life.

xoxoxoxo ♡

dianne said...

That's funny Pugsley my sweet, I thought the subway would be a good place to sleep if it's cold, raining or snowing, though it would be a little noisy.
I guess you are referring to the song by Petula Clark?

xoxoxo ♡

dianne said...

Thanks Foamy dear, if only I had the talent to write such a poem, it is so very beautiful I think.

xoxoxoxo ♡

Shweta Tiwari said...

Dianne,

I never got the chance to read this poem, but I had heard the last few lines in a movie.

Thank you for posting it. It is so lovely.

Love

Craftsman of light said...

When we feel lost we're unable to relate, and we pour our yearnings on a Beloved,

But'the Beloved' has'nt moved anywhere but slid behind our shadows.
The Beloved knows only to Love, Love has no gender,
it is free and probably why we call it as God's own heart beat, and wont vanish as long as your heart beats!

i'm not spiritual,i consider living life and honouring it in every form could be what 'spiritual' could eventually represent for me,

This is only as how i see it!

Yet, i must admit my contradictions....and make place that i can only give to a Beloved.
Do i make sense?
or have i lost it at this point?

Craftsman of light said...

oh yes i love Rilke too!

dianne said...

Thank you dear Shweta

I had not read this poem either, I found it last night and was so taken with its beauty that I wanted to put it here amongst the other things that I love. I am so pleased that you enjoyed it also.

Love

xoxoxo ♡

dianne said...

Dearest COL ,
I find my own spiritually in the beauty of Nature, the Seasons, the Elements, the beauty that Earth, the Sky and the Oceans give us.
I would not say that I am strictly religious but I do have my own moral code that I live by, helping others and treating people as I would have them treat me and I do follow the Ten Commandments of the Bible, I feel they are a guideline that enhances my beliefs.

When Rilke wrote this particular poem he had his own personal idea of what he was saying to his readers ... but with all poetry it is open to interpretation.
To me he is longing for something or someone which he does not have, something that he sees in everything around him, a feeling of something that is not quite tangible, an absence of something or someone who is missing from his life and every time he gets close he feels a presence of that person there but they have gone ... maybe it is about missed opportunities, being so close to touch but because of timing had missed out, memories that he is trying to recapture.
Whatever he is saying it has touched me, I see imagery, a feeling of longing but most of all great beauty in his words.
I do love his writing.

xoxoxoxo ♡

J Cosmo Newbery said...

Funny Foam, I thought the same.

dianne said...

Thank you dear J Cosmo you are very sweet and what a compliment; if only I had written this poem, I think it is so beautiful.

xoxoxo ♡

Leovi said...

Deep and beautiful feelings made my skin.

dianne said...

Yes dear Leovi it is deep and beautiful.

Saludos xoxoxo ♡

Ruela said...

beautiful!

dianne said...

Yes Ruela dear it is a beautiful poem by Rilke, one of my favourites.
Thank you for visiting. :)

xoxoxo ♡