RILKE | April: A Light too Bright to Bear...
RILKE | April: A Light too
Bright to Bear...
 |
"...inner worlds now the most practiced / of distances, as the other side of thin air: pure, immense no longer habitable." from To Music, a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke This week, an image called Spring Snow, Alpine Moor. Also: two new translations from the German.
|
A Light too Bright to Bear, or the
Patience of Mountain Trees
...that carry the weight of a hundred
workdays in the overfilled fruits,
serving, full of patience, trying, like
that which all measure transcends,
is still to be lifted up and offered,
when one willingly, throughout a long life,
wants but this one thing and grows and is silent.
from: New Poems, the other Part. The Apple Orchard
The photo above was made around the end of March at the very center
of the German-speaking part of the European Alps. There are many things
here that I might want to call attention to: like the dynamic quality of the
snowpack at this time of year—frozen solid in the early morning hours.
(While making the photo, I was walking effortlessly with skis tied to my
backpack.) And then turning hopelessly slushy an hour or two before noon.
Or one might mention the intense brilliance of the spring mountain sunlight;
Or perhaps the beautiful alpine moor which lies dormant six feet below
the snow's surface.
But most especially I'm moved by a single subtle detail—those little trees in
the foreground. They're dwarf mountain pines (Pinus mugo) growing right at
treelimit. I've passed these trees on treks hundreds of times and have come to
see them as sentinels of the higher, treeless alpine country pictured in the
background. I have also come to greatly admire their soft-spoken tenacity
in standing their ground in what most would call inhospitable country.
After all, they're completely snowbound for as much as five or six months
of the year.
Journeying through the picture or the image in this way creates a kind
of background for the two new Rilke translations I've brought together
here. One, the Early Apollo, from the beginning of the New Poems
(c. 1906), reveals a voice which is full of confidence and a remarkale
energy. And, of course, it's also full of the striking imagery which is so
characteristic ot the Rilke of this middle or Paris period. Here, we have
the idea of the poetry made by a god, standing before us like a mountain
of white light, which is almost too pure, too powerful, to bare.
The second poem, from the first part of the Sonnets to Orpheus (1922),
composed some 16 years later, shows a much more feminine, almost playful,
aspect of Rilke's work. This is the piece which Rilke sent to friends, written
out longhand, with the instructions to paste it over the original 21st sonnet
in the collection which had just been published.
Instead of the flashing brilliance of the mountain god, the sonnet speaks
to us of the patience of beings that have endured long, harsh, winters,
and then, like the humble pines of the highcountry pictured above, offer us
their art in the manner in which that young mothers are sometimes heard
to sing to their children:
O, what her teacher taught her, such plenitude,
and that which is pressed into roots and long
heavy, twisted trunks: she sings, she sings!
Let's listen:
|
Früher
Apollo Wie manches Mal durch das noch unbelaubte Gezweig ein Morgen durchsieht, der schon ganz im Frühling ist: so ist in seinem Haupte nichts, was verhindern könnte, das der Glanz aller Gedichte uns fast tödlich träfe; denn noch kein Schatten ist in seinem Schaun, zu kühl für Lorbeer sind noch seine Schläfe, und später erst wird aus den Augenbraun hochstämmig sich der Rosengarten heben, aus welchem Blätter, einzeln, ausgelöst hintreiben werden auf des Mundes Beben, der jetzt noch still ist, niegebraucht und blinkend und nur mit seinem Lächeln etwas trinkend, als würde ihm sein Singen eingeflößt. aus: Neuen Gedichte (7.VII.1906, Paris) |
Early
Apollo As when sometimes through the still leafless branches a morning appears that is already wholly spring: so there is in his face nothing that could keep the radiance of all poetry from mortally striking us. for there are not yet shadows in his looking, too cool for laurel are yet his temples, and only later, from the brown of the eyes, will the high-stemmed rose garden ascend, out of which leaves, solitary, stirring, driving themselves upon the trembling mouth, that is yet still, not yet used and flashing, and drinking only with his smile, as if his singing were whispered in his ear. from: New Poems (VII.7.1906, Paris) |
|
XXI (ERSTER
TEIL) Frühling ist wiedergekommen. Die Erde ist wie ein Kind, daß Gedichte weiß, viele, o viele . . . . Für die Beschwerde langen Lernens bekommt sie den Preis. Streng war ihr Lehrer. Wir mochten das Weiße an dem Barte des alten Manns. Nun, wie das Grüne, das Blaue heiße, dürfen wir fragen: sie kanns, sie kanns! Erde, die Frei hat, du glückliche, spiele nun mit den Kindern. Wir wollen dich fangen, fröhliche Erde. Dem Frohsten gelingts. O, was der Lehrer sie lehrte, das Viele, und was gedruckt steht in Wurzeln und langen schwierigen Stämmen: sie singts, sie singts! aus: Sonetten an Orpheus Rainer Maria Rilke |
XXI (FIRST PART) Spring has again returned. The Earth is like a child that knows many poems, many, o so many . . . . For the hardship of such long learning she receives the prize. Strict was her teacher. The white in the old man's beard pleases us. Now, what to call green, to call blue, we dare to ask: she knows, she knows! Earth, now free, you happy one, play with the children. We want to catch you, joyful Earth. Only the most joyful can do it. O, what her teacher taught her, such plenitude, and that which is pressed into roots and long heavy, twisted trunks: she sings, she sings! from: Sonnets to Orpheus (tr. Cliff Crego) |
New English translations
from the German of 80
of Rainer Maria Rilke's
best poems, together
with 120 color prints
from the High Wallowas.
With introduction . . .
|
| preview opens in new window |
| about RILKE IN THE WALLOWAS |
| view / print
Picture/Poem
Poster: Sonnets to Orpheus XXI (86 K) | or
download
as PDF |
| 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:
(27) March: The Time in Stones
(26) March: The Music in Things
please follow my RilkeQuotes twitter
stream if you'd like timely updates
|
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 |
|
See also: new |
|
"Straight
roads, Slow rivers, Deep clay." |
A collection of contemporary Dutch poetry in English translation, with commentary and photographs by Cliff Crego |
