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More poems by Rainer Maria RilkeRainer Maria Rilke | Print this page.Print | Order a PoetryNotes Analysis of this poem.Analysis | View and Write CommentsComments

Growing Old

Rainer Maria Rilke

In some summers there is so much fruit,
the peasants decide not to reap any more.
Not having reaped you, oh my days,
my nights, have I let the slow flames
of your lovely produce fall into ashes?

My nights, my days, you have borne so much!
All your branches have retained the gesture
of that long labor you are rising from:
my days, my nights. Oh my rustic friends!

I look for what was so good for you.
Oh my lovely, half-dead trees,
could some equal sweetness still
stroke your leaves, open your calyx?

Ah, no more fruit! But one last time
bloom in fruitless blossoming
without planning, without reckoning,
as useless as the powers of millenia.


Translated by A. Poulin

Added: 2 Mar 2002 | Last Read: 5 Sep 2008 5:09 AM | Viewed: 2984 times

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URL: http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3246/ | Viewed on 5 September 2008.
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