Self-Portrait
The steadfastness of generations of nobility
shows in the curving lines that form the eyebrows.
And the blue eyes still show traces of childhood fears
and of humility here and there, not of a servant's,
yet of one who serves obediantly, and of a woman.
The mouth formed as a mouth, large and accurate,
not given to long phrases, but to express
persuasively what is right. The forehead without guile
and favoring the shadows of quiet downward gazing.
This, as a coherent whole, only casually observed;
never as yet tried in suffering or succeeding,
held together for an enduring fulfillment,
yet so as if for times to come, out of these scattered things,
something serious and lasting were being planned.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Lament (O how all things are far removed)
O how all things are far removed
and long have passed away.
I do believe the star,
whose light my face reflects,
is dead and has been so
for many thousand years.
I had a vision of a passing boat
and heard some voices saying disquieting things.
I heard a clock strike in some distant house...
but in which house?...
I long to quiet my anxious heart
and stand beneath the sky's immensity.
I long to pray...
And one of all the stars
must still exist.
I do believe that I would know
which one alone
endured,
and which like a white city stands
at the ray's end shining in the heavens.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Night (O you whose countenance)
Night. O you whose countenance, dissolved
in deepness, hovers above my face.
You who are the heaviest counterweight
to my astounding contemplation.
Night, that trembles as reflected in my eyes,
but in itself strong;
inexhaustible creation, dominant,
enduring beyond the earth's endurance;
Night, full of newly created stars that leave
trails of fire streaming from their seams
as they soar in inaudible adventure
through interstellar space:
how, overshadowed by your all-embracing vastness,
I appear minute!---
Yet, being one with the ever more darkening earth,
I dare to be in you.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Song
(From the diaries of Malte Laurids Brigge)
You, whom I do not tell that all night long
I lie weeping,
whose very being makes me feel wanting
like a cradle.
You, who do not tell me, that you lie awake
thinking of me:--
what, if we carried all these longings within us
without ever being overwhelmed by them,
letting them pass?
Look at these lovers, tormented by love,
when first they begin confessing,
how soon they lie!
You make me feel alone. I try imagining:
one moment it is you, then it's the soaring wind;
a fragrance comes and goes but never lasts.
Oh, within my arms I lost all whom I loved!
Only you remain, always reborn again.
For since I never held you, I hold you fast.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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The Voices
The rich and fortunate do well to keep silent,
for no one cares to know who and what they are.
But those in need must reveal themselves,
must say: I am blind,
or: I'm on the verge of going blind,
or: nothing goes well with me on earth,
or: I have a sickly child,
or: I have little to hold me together...
And chances are this is not nearly enough.
And because people try to ignore them as they
pass by them: these unfortunate ones have to sing!
And at times one hears some excellent singing!
Of course, people differ in their tastes: some would
prefer to listen to choirs of boy-castrati.
But God himself comes often and stays long,
when the castrati's singing disturbs Him.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Rememberance
And you wait, keep waiting for that one thing
which would infinitely enrich your life:
the powerful, uniquely uncommon,
the awakening of dormant stones,
depths that would reveal you to yourself.
In the dusk you notice the book shelves
with their volumes in gold and in brown;
and you think of far lands you journeyed,
of pictures and of shimmering gowns
worn by women you conquered and lost.
And it comes to you all of a sudden:
That was it! And you arise, for you are
aware of a year in your distant past
with its fears and events and prayers.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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The Song Of The Beggar
I am always going from door to door,
whether in rain or heat,
and sometimes I will lay my right ear in
the palm of my right hand.
And as I speak my voice seems strange as if
it were alien to me,
for I'm not certain whose voice is crying:
mine or someone else's.
I cry for a pittance to sustain me.
The poets cry for more.
In the end I conceal my entire face
and cover both my eyes;
there it lies in my hands with all its weight
and looks as if at rest,
so no one may think I had no place where-
upon to lay my head.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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The Neighbor
Strange violin, why do you follow me?
In how many foreign cities did you
speak of your lonely nights and those of mine.
Are you being played by hundreds? Or by one?
Do in all great cities men exist
who tormented and in deep despair
would have sought the river but for you?
And why does your playing always reach me?
Why is it that I am always neighbor
to those lost ones who are forced to sing
and to say: Life is infinitely heavier
than the heaviness of all things.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Night (This night, agitated by the growing storm)
This night, agitated by the growing storm,
how it has suddenly expanded its dimensions--,
that ordinarily would have gone unnoticed,
like a cloth folded, and hidden in the folds of time.
Where the stars give resistance it does not stop there,
neither does it begin within the forest's depths,
nor show upon the surface of my face
nor with your appearance.
The lamps keep swaying, fully unaware:
is our light lying?
Is night the only reality
that has endured through thousands of years?
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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In The Beginning
Ever since those wondrous days of Creation
our Lord God sleeps: we are His sleep.
And He accepted this in His indulgence,
resigned to rest among the distant stars.
Our actions stopped Him from reacting,
for His fist-tight hand is numbed by sleep,
and the times brought in the age of heroes
during which our dark hearts plundered Him.
Sometimes He appears as if tormented,
and His body jerks as if plagued by pain;
but these spells are always outweighed by the
number of His countless other worlds.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Song Of The Orphan
I am no one and never will be anyone,
for I am far too small to claim to be;
not even later.
Mothers and Fathers,
take pity on me.
I fear it will not pay to raise me:
I shall fall victim to the mower's scythe.
No one can find me useful now: I am too young,
and tomorrow will be too late.
I only have one dress,
worn thin and faded,
but it will last an eternity
even before God, perhaps.
I only have this whispy hair
(that always remained the same)
yet once was someone's dearest love.
Now he has nothing that he loves.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Heartbeat
Only mouths are we. Who sings the distant heart
which safely exists in the center of all things?
His giant heartbeat is diverted in us
into little pulses. And his giant grief
is, like his giant jubilation, far too
great for us. And so we tear ourselves away
from him time after time, remaining only
mouths. But unexepectedly and secretly
the giant heartbeat enters our being,
so that we scream ----,
and are transformed in being and in countenance.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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0371 Reading behind the lines
So if it makes you feel great,
OK, go ahead -
as long as you're making yourself more attractive
for me, not your next husband...
OK, look like Anne Robinson if you must;
yes, she is great seen full-face, I grant
but now she's got no profile
to match those wit-sharp comments
to a sideways glance...
and yes, it's blushingly well-known
than a man can't even recognise his own wife in a crowd
if she's had her hair done in the interim...
so who am I - except the one who loves you
like the supper we've had every week
since we were courting? ...
but let me just say this:
I who have loved you
in my quiet way
like a favourite book (now, where did I put it? ...)
love those fine lines, that time and - we - have etched;
we men, surprise, are something of a connoisseur of lines:
the lines that cross your forehead: there, because
you're just so silly about not being seen by other men
with spectacles on your nose -
as if that told strange men
a lie and not the truth...
if they were lines of worry, anxiety, failure -
they'd be my responsibility, not yours...
and then the lines around the mouth:
that's a national thing in part -
it's well known that American women
welcome you with open mouth;
(and teeth! ...pearls? more like spotlights...) but
Europeans greet you with a smile of eyes;
(and there are cruder analogies I'll leave unsaid) :
so look carefully, man,
those smile-lines - a little forced;
or natural?
accommodating show-biz whopping tooth-caps?
upward and sweet-natured? or that downward turn
that bespeaks a critical mind you might come home to every night?
then the lines under your eyes - none of my business, those:
that's a matter of heredity or, OK, cosmetic surgery...
please yourself, my darling;
you've bags of skin, I've bags of money. That was a joke.
but the lines around the sides of your sweet eyes -
ah, how I love those...
the European smile that makes a man's heart melt;
'crow's feet' indeed! there's written, years of happy life,
and children, friends; the world itself
in those sweet lines...
' In those dear lines, my love, your soul is caught;
Your soul; my life; without them I am aught.'...
OK go ahead, spend my money if it makes you happy -
you know I'll always go along with you...
(I don't know yet, how I'll respond
at parties now when carefree younger men
give you that searching glance that chancers give...)
But please, I beg of you, don't ask your surgeon
with his character-erasing tools
to take away those lines around the corners of your eyes,
that smile at me
from a lifetime that's been shared.
poem by Michael Shepherd
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Extinguish Thou My Eyes
Extinguish Thou my eyes:I still can see Thee,
deprive my ears of sound:I still can hear Thee,
and without feet I still can come to Thee,
and without voice I still can call to Thee.
Sever my arms from me, I still will hold Thee
with all my heart as with a single hand,
arrest my heart, my brain will keep on beating,
and Should Thy fire at last my brain consume,
the flowing of my blood will carry Thee.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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Slumber Song
Some day, if I should ever lose you,
will you be able then to go to sleep
without me softly whispering above you
like night air stirring in the linden tree?
Without my waking here and watching
and saying words as tender as eyelids
that come to rest weightlessly upon your breast,
upon your sleeping limbs, upon your lips?
Without my touching you and leaving you
alone with what is yours, like a summer garden
that is overflowing with masses
of melissa and star-anise?
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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The Eyes Of A Woman
In the eyes of a woman, in a world of desire,
From the moment she looked my way. I was so hypnotized
Should I show how I feel, shes the magnet, Im steel
The eyes of a woman, theres nowhere to run
The eyes of a woman
In the arms of an angel, in a dangerous disguise
Loves a blue fascination
Its a mystery that burns, takes a lifetime to learn
The eyes of a woman, theres nowhere to run
The eyes of a woman, my fears come undone
In the eyes of a woman, theres nowhere to run
The eyes of a woman, my fears come undone
Nowhere to run
Nowhere to run
Nowhere to run
song performed by by Journey
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Poet's Rue
I remember as a young boy
Sitting on top Mount Parnassus
Consumed in writing I enjoyed.
Mostly poetry to express
At the time my innermost thoughts
While below my childhood playmates
Romped and played and most often fought.
And myself trying to translate
Feelings into coherent thought
And writing them down on paper.
I recollect those times that taught
Self- discipline behavior.
Yet if I lived it all again
I would be one of those children.
poem by Albert Ahearn
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Side drawings of a monk
He transcribes every word
with every stripe and line
like it belongs
and deep in the dark night
he writes on
and unseeing his eye falls
over walls
where the shades draw long lines
and his thoughts
takes their own direction
and for long moments
he looks at his own life
to know where
to trim things in place
or iron them out.
Somewhere in his soul
he longs for another place
away from the chilling dungeons
that the cloister locks in
and suddenly he wants out.
In his thoughts he sees a young woman
remembering from his childhood days
and her eyes radiates blue like the sky
and his heart bounces while a smile
folds softly around the corners of her mouth.
When his eyes catches the paper again
his thoughts says damn
but there’s no word
coming over his lips
and a big blot mark
next to the neat rows
of his writing
where he praises the virgin.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Female Facial Facade
One need not know her life story
to actually know this woman.
Her character is quite clearly
Sculptured into her youthful hewn
Face: her flawless forehead and arched brows
bridge atop two mirrored blue pools:
Eyes that conceal lies that somehow
besmirch her most precious jewels.
Her celestial nose turned upward
suggesting a pretentious snob;
And her mouth: two full, pinkish-red,
fleshy folds with a subtle sneer
imperceptibly perceived
concealing her feigned innocence.
poem by Albert Ahearn
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Falling Stars
Do you remember still the falling stars
that like swift horses through the heavens raced
and suddenly leaped across the hurdles
of our wishes--do you recall? And we
did make so many! For there were countless numbers
of stars: each time we looked above we were
astounded by the swiftness of their daring play,
while in our hearts we felt safe and secure
watching these brilliant bodies disintegrate,
knowing somehow we had survived their fall.
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming
poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
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A Pigeon
I've picked up your name from the floor
and held it for long on the palm of my hand
watching it gently peck its lines
until there remained nothing not a single crumb
and your name well fed slept for a while
in lines of death in lines of life
in lines of the head and lines of the heart
in intricate patterns that sealed me for too long
there was a lullaby I wanted to sing
but I was not able to open my mouth
for fear you'll wake up and disappear
and I promised myself I would never dropp you again
poem by Miroslava Odalovic
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