Behind All Words, the Unsayable Stands
Happy are those who know:
Behind all words, the Unsayable stands;
And from that source alone, the Infinite
Crosses over to gladness, and us –
Free of our bridges
Built with the stone of distinctions;
So that always, within each delight,
We gaze at what is purely single and joined.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke ~
(On February 15, 1924, Rainer Maria Rilke inscribed these lines
on the copy of The Duino Elegies that he gave to his Polish translator.)
Photo by Cyrus Crossan on Unsplash
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That Intimate Vastness
What birds plunge through is not the intimate space
in which you see all forms intensified.
(Out in the Open, you would be denied
your self, would disappear into that vastness.)
Space reaches from us and construes the world:
to know a tree, in its true element,
throw inner space around it, from that pure
abundance in you. Surround it with restraint.
It has no limits. Not till it is held
in your renouncing is it truly there.
