Rose, you majesty-once, to the ancients, you were <br />just a calyx with the simplest of rims. <br />But for us, you are the full, the numberless flower, <br />the inexhaustible countenance. <br /> <br />In your wealth you seem to be wearing gown upon gown <br />upon a body of nothing but light; <br />yet each seperate petal is at the same time the negation <br />of all clothing and the refusal of it. <br /> <br />Your fragrance has been calling its sweetest names <br />in our direction, for hundreds of years; <br />suddenly it hangs in the air like fame. <br /> <br />Even so, we have never known what to call it; we guess... <br />And memory is filled with it unawares <br />which we prayed for from hours that belong to us. <br /> <br /> <br />Translated by Stephen Mitchell<br /><br />Rainer Maria Rilke<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-sonnets-to-orpheus-book-2-vi/
