Reflections by Jerry Webber


Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Carrying Wind and Open Spaces

I give you these lines from a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke:


Don't be afraid to suffer, give
the heaviness back to the weight of the earth;
mountains are heavy, seas are heavy.

Even those trees you planted as children
became too heavy long ago -- you couldn't carry them now.
But you can carry the winds . . . and the open spaces . . .



[Selected Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. by Robert Bly]

1 comment:

kathkell said...

falling into a heaviness of its own
temporarily far from me
the weight lifts from where it is planted
i fall free

forcing even my lids to lay still
as i allow, my arms slide down, settle
i think of the sleep which alludes me

faintly the remembered wind whispers
my name with the soul quieting
sounds of stillness
it gently touches flutteringly with its caress
across my salt streaked cheeks and
as i allow it, the space opens to me

even from yesterday and before tomorrow
god's lips blow breath far into my future
carrying me from the weight of the day
and whispering comfort to me even now
he lifts from me my mountain, my seas
as i lay still in this weightless moment
i carry the wind