Ren

in thoughts, not breaths;

in feelings, not figures on a dial.

We should count time by heart-throbs.

...The dead have all the glory of the world.

Why will we live and not be glorious?

We can never be deathless till we die."

Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by C. F. Macintyre

Oh, everything is far

and long ago.

I believe that star these thousand years is dead,

though I still see its light.

I believe, in that boat

passing though the night

something fearful was said.

In the house a clock

struck . . .

Where did it strike? . . .

I would like to walk

out of my heart

under the wide sky.

I would like to pray.

One of all these stars

must still exist.

I believe I know

which one

still lasts

and stands like a city, white

in the sky at the end of the beam of light . . .

With anyone to death, come so far short

They might as well not try to go at all.

No, from the time when one is sick to death,

One is alone, and he died more alone.

Friends make pretense of following to the grave,

But before one is in it, their minds are turned

And making the best of their way back to life

And living people, and things they understand."

Don't carry it to someone else this time.

Tell me about it if it's something human.

let me into your grief.

I just found what the matter was tonight:

I've been a-choking like a nursery tree

When it outgrows the wire band of it's name tag."

-A Hundred Collars, Robert Frost