Dancing With Rilke

"Spring has returned. The earth

is like a child that knows poems;

much, O many...for the work

of that long learning she wins the prize."

Yes -

birth inside birth like a seed,

tomorrow's hope today
please come; help us to life again

"Strict was her teacher. We liked the white

on the old man's beard. 

Now the names of the greens, the blues

we are aloud to ask: She knows! She knows!"

Why is it that we always forget

to take your essay colors

and hoard them like grain, that we may sustain
ourselves deep inside these lines.

"Earth, school's out, you happy thing, play!

Now with the children. We want to catch you,

merry Earth. The happiest will succeed."

But you never slow your promise

to keep us young by keeping pace.

And it feels like an ancient lesson
always running beyond our grasp.

"O, what the teacher taught her, all those things

that lie pressed in roots and long

heavy branches: she sings them, she sings them!" *

But you are here;

I feel you, a lover's breath short 

and long,

and proof that we are again
alive. **

* Left side: Frühling ist wiedergekommen. Die Erde from Sonnets to Orpheus by Rainer Maria Rilke,trans. by whomever runs this blog and myself.

**Right side: My spontaneous dance to Rilke's lead.

Die Musik