you must realize that something is happening
It's morning, and I've been awake and doing things since about six-thirty -- which is a nice contrast to yesterday, when I could not seem to bestir myself to move before noon. While I do enjoy the rarity of being able to sleep late, I think I like this morning's state of awareness better. It's also very useful, as I have a great deal of schoolwork to do before tomorrow and which I should probably soon get back to, but before I do...
April is National Poetry Month, and although this year I'm getting started a bit late, I always like sharing things during this time. Sometimes I'll post old familiar favorites, sometimes things that are newer or for whatever reason less well known.
Today, it's a passage by Rainer Maria Rilke.
...And if only we arrange our life in accordance with the principle which tells us that we must always trust in the difficult, then what now appears to us as the most alien will become our most intimate and trusted experience. How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.
So you mustn't be frightened, dear Mr. Kappus, if a sadness rises in front of you, larger than any you have ever seen; if an anxiety, like light and cloud-shadows, moves over your hands and over everything you do. You must realize that something is happening to you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand and will not let you fall....
The quote above is taken from the eighth of Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, which are a compilation of ten letters written over the course of a five-year correspondence between Rilke and a young man named Franz Kappus. I find them incredibly evocative and thought-provoking, and always end up in a meditative and introspective state of mind after reading from them. From any of them, really, though this is one of my favorite passages.
As with all of Rilke's writing, the translation makes a great deal of difference in the quality of the poem as presented and in its interpretation. This one is by Stephen Mitchell. I personally have a hit-or-miss affection for Mitchell's translations, but in this case and with this particular work I like it very much.
April is National Poetry Month, and although this year I'm getting started a bit late, I always like sharing things during this time. Sometimes I'll post old familiar favorites, sometimes things that are newer or for whatever reason less well known.
Today, it's a passage by Rainer Maria Rilke.
...And if only we arrange our life in accordance with the principle which tells us that we must always trust in the difficult, then what now appears to us as the most alien will become our most intimate and trusted experience. How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.
So you mustn't be frightened, dear Mr. Kappus, if a sadness rises in front of you, larger than any you have ever seen; if an anxiety, like light and cloud-shadows, moves over your hands and over everything you do. You must realize that something is happening to you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand and will not let you fall....
The quote above is taken from the eighth of Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, which are a compilation of ten letters written over the course of a five-year correspondence between Rilke and a young man named Franz Kappus. I find them incredibly evocative and thought-provoking, and always end up in a meditative and introspective state of mind after reading from them. From any of them, really, though this is one of my favorite passages.
As with all of Rilke's writing, the translation makes a great deal of difference in the quality of the poem as presented and in its interpretation. This one is by Stephen Mitchell. I personally have a hit-or-miss affection for Mitchell's translations, but in this case and with this particular work I like it very much.