Poet's Corner: The Gazelle by Rainer Maria Rilke

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

So Rilke is on my mind, not just because poetry month is coming up, but also because BTS' Jimin released the first song from his solo album and for the music video he decided to paint a passage from Rilke in the original German on his bare chest. I know! But yes! This is not that poem, but another.

The Gazelle by Rainer Maria Rilke (trans. Stephen Mitchell)

Enchanted thing: how can two chosen words
ever attain the harmony of pure rhyme
that pulses through you as your body stirs?
Out of your forehead branch and lyre climb,
.
and all your features pass in simile,through
the songs of love whose words, as light as rose-
petals, rest on the face of someone who
has put his book away and shut his eyes:
.
to see you: tensed, as it each leg were a gun
loaded with leaps, but not fired while your neck
holds your head still, listening: as when,
.
while swimming in some isolated place,
a girl hears leaves rustle, and turns to look:
the forest pool reflected in her face.

Comments

[firecat]

I love Rilke and I haven't seen that one before! Stephen Mitchell is a really talented translator.

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

Oh, yes? That's cool. It's among his animal poems. I don't know if he saw the gazelle at the zoo (with the panther and swan) or not.

Yes, if I care a lot about a poet, I try to make certain the translator I'm reading is good. And he's good.