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Rainer Maria Rilke

Rainer Maria Rilke Quotes

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Famous Rainer Maria Rilke Quotes

“We discover that we do not know our role; we look for a mirror; we want to remove our make-up and take off what is false and real. But somewhere a piece of disguise that we forgot still sticks to us. A trace of exaggeration remains in our eyebrows; we do not notice that the corners of our mouth are bent. And so we walk around, a mockery and a mere half: neither having achieved being nor actors.”

KnowsWantLooksStillsRealActorsWalksHalfRolesPiecesMouthsMirrorsRemainsSticksMereCornersRemoveDisguiseBentEyebrowsExaggerationMockery
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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“They all have tired mouths and bright seamless souls. And a longing (as for sin) sometimes haunts their dreams. They are almost all alike; in God's gardens they keep still, like many, many intervals in his might and melody. Only when they spread their wings are they wakers of a wind: as if God with his broad sculptor- hands leafed through the pages in the dark book of the beginning.”

IfsStillsBookSoulSometimesDreamHandsMightDarkSinWindPagesMouthsGardenLongingTiredWingsSpreadMelodyBroadsIntervalsSculptorsSeamless
Book:The Book of Images
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“O how all things are far removed and long have passed away. I do believe the star, whose light my face reflects, is dead and has been so for many thousand years. I had a vision of a passing boat and heard some voices saying disquieting things. I heard a clock strike in some distant house... but in which house?... I long to quiet my anxious heart and stand beneath the sky's immensity. I long to pray... And one of all the stars must still exist. I do believe that I would know which one alone endured, and which like a white city stands at the ray's end shining in the heavens.”

KnowsYearsBelieveHeartLongHas BeensStillsEndsLightFacesHouseHeavenStarsVoiceWhiteCitiesVisionHeardSkyPrayingThousandQuietAll ThingsShiningStrikesPassingPassingsBoatClockRaysAnxiousThousand YearsPassed AwayImmensity
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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“FALLING STARS: Do you remember still the falling stars that like swift horses through the heavens raced and suddenly leaped across the hurdles of our wishes -- do you recall? And we did make so many! For there were countless numbers of stars: each time we looked above we were astounded by the swiftness of their daring play, while in our hearts we felt safe and secure watching these brilliant bodies disintegrate, knowing somehow we had survived their fall.”

HeartStillsPlayBodyRememberFallHeavenWishStarsFeltNumbersKnowingSafeHorseBrilliantSecureDaringRecallsSurvivedHurdleAstoundedSwiftness
Book:Rainer Maria Rilke: Selected Poems
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“And still it is not enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. For it is not yet the memories themselves. Not until they have turned to blood within us, to glance, to gesture, nameless and no longer to be distinguished from ourselves - not until then can it happen that in a most rare hour the first word of a verse arises in their midst and goes forth from them.”

FirstsStillsEnoughHappensAbleWaitingHoursMemoriesForgetBloodAriseMidstGesturesVersesGlancesDistinguishedNamelessGreat Patience
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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“You, Beloved, who are all the gardens I have ever gazed at, longing. An open window in a country house - , and you almost stepped out, pensive, to meet me. Streets that I chanced upon, - you had just walked down them and vanished. And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors were still dizzy with your presence and, startled, gave back my too-sudden image. Who knows? Perhaps the same bird echoed through both of us yesterday, separate, in the evening.”

KnowsStillsCountrySometimesHouseStreetsBirdGardenWindowMirrorsLongingYesterdayEveningBelovedShopsDizzyYour PresencePensiveCountry Houses
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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“I am so afraid of people's words.They describe so distinctly everything: And this they call dog and that they call house, here the start and there the end. I worry about their mockery with words, they know everything, what will be, what was; no mountain is still miraculous; and their house and yard lead right up to God. I want to warn and object: Let the things be! I enjoy listening to the sound they are making. But you always touch: and they hush and stand still. That's how you kill.”

PeopleKnowsWantStillsEndsHouseEnjoySoundWorryDogObjectsListeningMountainYardsMiraculousMockeryHush
Book:Pictures of God: Rilke's Religious Poetry Including
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“My life is not this steeply sloping hour, in which you see me hurrying. Much stands behind me; I stand before it like a tree; I am only one of my many mouths, and at that, the one that will be still the soonest. I am the rest between two notes, which are somehow always in discord because Death’s note wants to climb over— but in the dark interval, reconciled, they stay there trembling. And the song goes on, beautiful.”

WantStillsTwoBeautifulLife IsSongHoursDarkBehindsTreeGoes OnMouthsNotesClimbsTremblingIntervalsDiscordHurrying
Book:Selected poems
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“I live my life in widening circle That reach out across the world. I may not ever complete the last one, But I give myself to it. I circle around God, that primordial tower. I have been circling for thousands of years, And I still don't know: am I a falcon, A storm, or a great song? [I, 2]”

KnowsWorldGivingYearsMayHas BeensStillsLastsSongStormCirclesReach OutTowersLiving My LifeI Live My LifeFalcon
Book:Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God
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“The sky puts on the darkening blue coat held for it by a row of ancient trees; you watch: and the lands grow distant in your sight, one journeying to heaven, one that falls; and leave you, not at home in either one, not quite so still and dark as the darkened houses, not calling to eternity with the passion of what becomes a star each night, and rises; and leave you (inexpressibly to unravel) your life, with its immensity and fear, so that, now bounded, now immeasurable it is alternately stone in you and star.”

StillsHomeNightFallPassionHouseHeavenStarsGrowsDarkWatchesDarknessTreeSkyLandCallingStonesEternitySightBlueAncientSunsetCoatsImmensityDarkeningAncient Trees
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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“O trees of life, O when are you wintering?We are not unified. We have no instinctslike those of migratory birds. Useless, and late,we force ourselves, suddenly, onto the wind,and fall down to an indifferent lake.We realise flowering and fading together.And somewhere lions still roam. Never knowing,as long as they have their splendour, of any weakness.”

LongStillsTogetherFallForceKnowingTreeWindLateBirdWeaknessUselessLakesRealisingLionsIndifferentFalling DownFadingUnifiedFloweringTree Of LifeSplendourMigratory Birds
Author:Rainer Maria Rilke
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