RAINER MARIA RILKE
New POEMS
A Bilingual Edition
Translated by Stephen Cohn
Northwestern University Press, 1998
The Heart of the Rose
Where is the outwardness
to what lies here, within?
Whose wound was ever dressed,
bandaged in such fine linen?
Reflected here, what skies
lie open and at ease
as in a lake within
these open roses
in which all softly rests
as if no accidental hand
could shake or make it spill?
Unable to contain
the riches that are theirs
they pour out the excess
sharing their inwardness
to enrich the days; until
the whole of summer seems
one great room, a room within a dream.
–Rilke, translated by Cohn
