Abend ~ Evening
Slowly the evening draws on its robe
held out to it by a row of ancient trees;
you gaze: and the landscape splits in two,
one part lifting skywards, while one falls;
leaving you not at home in either one,
not so silent as the darkened houses,
nor calling to eternity with the passion
of what becomes a star each night, and rises;
leaving you (without words) to unravel
your anxious, immense, fast-ripening life,
so that, now elusive, and now grasped,
it becomes in you, in turn, both stone and star.
Rainer Maria Rilke, circa 1910
Leaves & Pages 
Thanks for this stunning Rilke poem. Did you translate it? If so, you did a beautiful job.
Condolences too for Canada’s (& the world’s!) loss of Leonard Cohen. A true artist the likes of which we’ll never see again.
Yes, I think Leonard Cohen has touched people around the world. His death is not all that surprising; word was out that he was not doing so well these past few months; but the announcement was still a shock. He’s been an important part of our personal musical landscape literally as long as we can remember. So it goes. The years do roll on by, faster and faster. Feeling very mortal ourselves these days, what with one thing and another. 2016 has been a year of loss and grief on a personal level – unexpected tragedy among friends and family, as well as the peaceful deaths of several well-loved elderly people in our lives – and it seems the loss of admired public figures serves to emphasize the ephemeral quality of our time here.
Rilke – one of my favourite poets. I muddle through reading him in German, and more easily in translation. This particular translation was written in the margin of one of my late father’s books, in his handwriting, though he may have found it elsewhere. I did fiddle with it a bit, too, rephrased a line or two which seemed overly awkward. Translation is hard!
I love this translation, by far the best I’ve found – well done to you and your dad!
“The ephemeral quality of our time here” is a beautiful way to put it, L&P. It’s strange how the passing of truly gifted & remarkable public figures like Leonard Cohen – & before him David Bowie – tends to make us more conscious of our own mortality. There’s probably a fancy psychological term for the phenomenon, but I’m damned if I know what it is. All I know is that it feels like losing a small part of yourself & your past.
Sorry to hear that 2016 has also been a year of losses for you on a personal level. Hope that’s not the case in 2017 & that your own health improves if it’s been problematic for you.
Translation is hard – mais oui! – but you did a great job of it. I also love that this was a handwritten translation you found in a book that once belonged to your dad. The past reaches out to us in unexpected ways sometimes. I hope you publish further Rilke translations in future. I’ll look forward to reading them as I do to reading everything you share with us.
Thank you for the kind words. I will definitely be sharing more Rilke now and then. The dark time of the year is here (hours of daylight wise, not emotionally, though winter is a bit of a downer, the older I get) and I find I read more poetry now, as life slows down and I have time to concentrate on my reading, versus snatching moments here and there.
2016 has been a rough year here. Two deaths in our family, of elderly people, so sad but reasonably easy to accept, and one much younger family member currently in palliative care with a somber prognosis. Several friends gone too soon, in tragic circumstances. My own health has not been greatest, some old injuries nagging and a few new things cropping up to keep me extra humble.
Life feels rather fragile these days. But keeping busy helps keep the blues at bay! Lots still to be happy about and grateful for, and each day does indeed feel like a thing to be treasured.
Everything melts
burns out:
lamp lampshade
the light itself
with no shade left
no world
belongs to you and you
belong
to no world
you are pulled
by rain and light
on roads coming
and going
from everywhere
to everywhere
Jaan Kaplinski (ca 1985)
Thank you very much for Rilke!
Marijke Stapert-Eggen
Holland
Oh, thank you so much for this. I am going to share it as a post tonight. We have had a very sad week here, just having lost a sister on Thursday. I wondered if I should write about it, and I think I shall just a little, with this beautiful poem.
Robert Frost has so many rooms dealing with a similar theme, like the famous “Birches.” Here’s one where he is slightly more cynical about it:
The Bear
The bear puts both arms round the tree above her
And draws it down as if it were a lover
And its choke-cherries lips to kiss goodby,
Then lets it snap back upright in the sky.
Her next step rocks a boulder on the wall.
(She’s making her cross-country in the fall.)
Her great weight creaks the barbed wire in its staples
As she flings over and off down through the maples,
Leaving on one wire tooth a lock of hair.
Such is the uncaged progress of the bear.
The world has room to make a bear feel free.
The universe seems cramped to you and me.
Man acts more like the poor bear in a cage
That all day fights a nervous inward rage,
His mood rejecting all his mind suggests.
He paces back and forth and never rests
The toe-nail click and shuffle of his feet,
The telescope at one end of his beat,
And at the other end the microscope,
Two instruments of nearly equal hope,
And in conjunction giving quite a spread.
Or if he rests from scientific tread,
’Tis only to sit back and sway his head
Through ninety-odd degrees of arc it seems,
Between two metaphysical extremes.
He sits back on his fundamental butt
With lifted snout and eyes (if any) shut
(He almost looks religious but he’s not),
And back and forth he sways from cheek to cheek,
At one extreme agreeing with one Greek,
At the other agreeing with another Greek,
Which may be thought but only so to speak.
A baggy figure equally pathetic
When sedentary and when peripatetic.
Thank you for this, Sean. Greatly enjoyed it. One of the lesser known Robert Frost poems, but, as with each and every one, rich in every way.
First time I truly understand this poem.