A prince survives by unseen acts. <br />At night the chief advisor knocked <br />at Frederick's workroom in the tower <br />and found him formulating facts <br />for treatises on wingèd power <br />while his penman turned out text. <br /> <br />It was in this aerie room <br />he'd walked all night with her on arm, <br />turbulent and barely fledged. <br />Whatever plans then sprang to mind, <br />whatever fondness deeply chimed <br />in recollection he would trash <br />and tend the frightened and impassioned <br />thing he wished to understand. <br />Every night he made a time <br />for nothing but the young unhandled <br />animal. It was her staring <br />inborn mind he'd worked to learn, <br /> <br />so he was lofted with her grace <br />when she, the bird that nobles praise, <br />thrown gleaming from his hand (her wingbeats raised <br />into the heartfelt morning air) <br />and diving like an angel struck the hern.<br /><br />Rainer Maria Rilke<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/falconry/
