Call to me to the one among your moments <br />that stands against you, ineluctably: <br />intimate as a dog's imploring glance <br />but, again, forever, turned away <br /> <br />when you think you've captured it at last. <br />What seems so far from you is most your own. <br />We are already free, and were dismissed <br />where we thought we soon would be at home. <br /> <br />Anxious, we keep longing for a foothold- <br />we, at times too young for what is old <br />and too old for what has never been; <br /> <br />doing justice only where we praise, <br />because we are the branch, the iron blade, <br />and sweet danger, ripening from within. <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-xxiii/
