"You know I'd like to slip"

You know I'd like to slip

from the loudly buzzing room

when the first pale stars,

high above the darkened oaks,

catch fire.

I want to make my way

through paths that few can find

in the hushed evening meadows,

with no dream but this:

you’re there, too.

"Weisst du, ich will mich schleichen"

Rainer Maria Rilke/translated by Frank Beck

This is from Rilke's second collection, Advent, published in December 1897. The poems were written in Prague and Munich during 1896 and 1897.

Many of the poems in this collection, like this one, show a more direct and sensual side of Rilke that gives little indication of the mystical, sometimes oracular, voice he would develop later. (The photo shows Rilke at the artist colony in Worpswede, near Bremen, in 1901 or 1902.)

Here's the German poem:

Weisst du, ich will mich schleichen

Leise aus lautem Kreis,

Wenn ich erst die bleichen

Sterne über den Eichen

Blühen weiss.

Wege will ich erkiesen,

Die selten wer betritt

In blassen Abendwiesen –

Und keinen Traum, als diesen:

Du gehst mit.

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