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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

The Apple Orchard

Rainer Maria Rilke

Come let us watch the sun go down
and walk in twilight through the orchard's green.
Does it not seem as if we had for long
collected, saved and harbored within us
old memories? To find releases and seek
new hopes, remembering half-forgotten joys,
mingled with darkness coming from within,
as we randomly voice our thoughts aloud
wandering beneath these harvest-laden trees
reminiscent of Durer woodcuts, branches
which, bent under the fully ripened fruit,
wait patiently, trying to outlast, to
serve another season's hundred days of toil,
straining, uncomplaining, by not breaking
but succeeding, even though the burden
should at times seem almost past endurance.
Not to falter! Not to be found wanting!

Thus must it be, when willingly you strive
throughout a long and uncomplaining life,
committed to one goal: to give yourself!
And silently to grow and to bear fruit.


Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming

Added: 2 Mar 2002 | Last Read: 26 May 2012 10:34 AM | Viewed: 3449 times

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URL: http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3279/ | Viewed on 26 May 2012.
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