September: Clear Water
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"O fountain mouth, giver, you, mouth, which speaks inexhaustibly of that one, pure thing,— you, mask of marble placed before the water's flowing face..." from Sonnet XV (SECOND PART), from Sonnets to Orpheus by Rainer Maria Rilke This week, an image called Clear Water. Also: a new translation from the German. | click here to view the Clear Water page in full color version | |
The guest poemfor this week is a new English
translation from the work of the German
language poet,
Rainer
Maria Rilke (from the
Rilke website, a concise hyperlinked biography).
The Sonnets to Orpheus
Rilke wrote the Sonnets
to Orpheus
*
at his modest chateau in Muzot, Switzerland, during a
period
of intense activity in February of 1922. It was to be his last published
work. The sequence of 55
poems, all sharing the same basic form and divided into two parts, is
characterized by a marvelously
light and quick energy. Indeed, they seem filled with the exuberance of the
mountains in which they
were composed, where everything seems larger than life, colors brighter and
more radiant, and
streams faster and more clear.
This then is a poetry of praise, of the air I breathe, the meadow through
which I walk, the beauty
of a single windflower opening to receive the morning sun, and yes, of praise
itself:
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XV [ZWEITER TEIL] O Brunnen-Mund, du gebender, du Mund, der unerschöpflich Eines, Reines, spricht,— du, vor des Wassers fließendem Gesicht, marmorne Maske. Und im Hintergrund der Aquädukte Herkunft. Weither an Gräbern vorbei, vom Hang des Apennins tragen sie dir dein Sagen zu, das dann am schwarzen Altern deines Kinns vorüberfällt in das Gefäß davor. Dies ist das schlafend hingelegte Ohr, das Marmorohr, in das du immer sprichst. Ein Ohr der Erde. Nur mit sich allein redet sie also. Schiebt ein Krug sich ein, so scheint es ihr, daß du sie unterbrichst. Rainer Maria Rilke (1922) |
XV [SECOND PART] O fountain mouth, giver, you, mouth, which speaks inexhaustibly of that one, pure thing,— you, mask of marble placed before the water's flowing face. In the background the aqueducts' source. Further, beyond all the graves, on the slopes of the Apennines, they bring you your stories, that then, upon the black aging of your chin, pour over into the vessel below. This is the ear that sleeps, laid down, the ear of marble, into which you always speak. An ear of the Earth. Only with herself alone does she thus converse. Insert a jug, and it seems to her that you interrupt. (tr. Cliff Crego) |
| view / print
Picture/Poem
Poster: Clear Water (Sonnet XV [2] (86 K) | or
download
as PDF |
| Selected Sonnets
to Orpheus twenty-two poems in the order they have been featured
(text only) |
PDF
of Six Sonnets |
*
Orpheus is the musician of musicians
of classical Greek mythology. He is the one
whose magical art of the lyre has the power to charm the whole of
Nature—the trees,
rivers, stones and even the wild animals, into the silence of listening.
Son of Calliope,
the muse of epic poetry, and a Thracian river-god (in some versions of the
story Apollo),
Orpheus married the nymph Eurydice who was fated to die of a serpent bite
on her heel.
In his profound grief, Orpheus follows his beloved into the underworld, and
with the
sound of his lyre enchants the resident deities into consenting to her release.
The one
condition which Orpheus has to meet during the ascent back to the upperworld
is that
he is not to look back at Eurydice. In a brief moment of weakness, he does,
however,
look back, whereby Eurydice vanishes forever without a trace.
Rejecting all women in his sadness afterwards, Orpheus is later ripped to
pieces by the
Maenads. This then is the source of the famous image of Orpheus' lyre and
singing head,
floating off through empty space to the island of Lesbos.
| see also
the Rilke
Posters |
| listen to other recordings in English and German of twelve poems from
The Book of Images at
The Rilke
Download Page
(#
Includes
instructions) |
See other recent additions of new English translations of
Rilke's poetry,
together with
featured photographs at:
((38) August: Mountains of the Heart . . .
(37) August: Moving Up into Mountain Time
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See also another website by Cliff Crego: The Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke |
a presentation of 80 of the best poems of Rilke in both German and new English translations: biography, links, posters |
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See also: new |
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"Straight
roads, Slow rivers, Deep clay." |
A collection of contemporary Dutch poetry in English translation, with commentary and photographs by Cliff Crego |