April 12, 2011

Spanish Trilogy (1)

 Mont Sainte Victoire Seen from les Lauves
by Paul Cézanne

From these clouds, that carelessly cover
the star that just was there—
from these mountains over there, now, for a while,
taken by the night—
from this river on the valley floor,
that glimmers with the sky's broken light—
from me and all of this: to make one thing.

From me and from the feel of the flock
brought back to the fold, to outlast
the great dark closing down of the world—
from me and from each flicker of light
from the shadowed houses—God, to make one thing.

From the strangers, among whom I know not one, God,
and from me, from me—
to make one thing. From all the slumbering ones,
coughing old men in the hospice,
sleep-drunken children in crowded beds,
from me and all I don't know,
to make the thing, oh God, God, that thing,
that, half-heaven, half-earth, gathers into its gravity
only the sum of flight,
weighing nothing but arrival.

Uncollected Poems

6 comments:

  1. I don't have words for this, except it is beautiful.

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  2. Yes. Vast, and yet pungent, here and now. I'm left speechless too. (almost)

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  3. i have read this in whole and in part several times and it leaves me breathless and still. awestruck. steven

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  4. I think "Spanish Trilogy" was originally meant at the Tenth Elegy, which Rilke later replaced with what now stands in its place. If definitely fits at this height, although the vision is perhaps too personal, narrowly defined as what remains for the artist --

    ...to make the thing, oh God, God, that thing,
    that, half-heaven, half-earth, gathers into its gravity
    only the sum of flight,
    weighing nothing but arrival.

    Which blows the roof off my belfry, to be sure, but Rilke finds an even greater charity to all humankind, to sing the hosannahs of life bridged with death, praising that moment when "a happy thing falls."

    Love, love, love this trilogy -- they are a summation which stands on their own achievement, equal to the sum of the Elegies ... Brendan

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  5. God, I love this. It is immense. 'Only the sum of flight, / weighing nothing but arrival.' Breathtaking. (It recalled the last lines of Larkin's 'Whitsun Weddings'.) Almost introspectively, hesitantly Whitmanesque in its specificities, in its one-thing-in-all-things.

    I have copied it out.

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  6. The Uncollected Poems so often seem to sing to me directly. The Edward Snow translation (which I have) of this one, though, is quite a bit more bumpy and difficult. This translation flows wonderfully well and I can only echo Brendan and you others in loving this plea:
    "from me and all I don't know,
    to make the thing, oh God, God, that thing,
    that, half-heaven, half-earth, gathers into its gravity
    only the sum of flight,
    weighing nothing but arrival."
    It is the poets prayer.

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"Everything is blooming most recklessly; if it were voices instead of colors, there would be an unbelievable shrieking into the heart of the night."

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Go ahead, bloom recklessly!