"Autumn Day" by Rainer Maria Rilke

Lord, it is time. The summer was so great.

Now lay your shadow across the sundials,

And let the winds of the field run free.

Tell the last of the grapes to ripen:

give them two more days of southern warmth,

urge them to completion, and then chase

one final sweetness into the heavy wine.

He who has no house now will not build one.

He who is alone will be that way a long time.

He’ll lie awake and read and write long letters,

and, up and down along the avenues,

will wander anxiously, when brown leaves scatter.

Rainer Maria Rilke; translated by Frank Beck

At the end of August 1902, Rilke left his wife Clara Westhoff and their infant daughter Ruth in Munich and went to Paris to work on a monograph about Rodin. He found a room in a small hotel in the rue Toullier, two blocks from the Jardin du Luxembourg, which seemed to promise "thinking, rest, solitude, everything I longed for."

Rilke spent his days wondering through Rodin's studio, taking notes and talking with the artist. At 27, Rilke had doubts about his writing, and it thrilled him to see the 62-year-old sculptor so confidently and diligently at work. The nights, however, were lonely (Clara didn't join her husband until early October), and out of that loneliness, on September 21, he wrote "Herbsttag" ("Autumn Day").

I've tried to reproduce Rilke's economical German, which contains few adjectives, uses only one metaphor ("chase/one final sweetness") and moves briskly, presenting three separate scenes in just 12 lines. Since "Herbsttag" first appeared in the second edition of The Book of Images (Das Buch der Bilder) in 1906, it has become one of Rilke's most widely anthologized and translated poems.

Herr: es ist Zeit. Der Sommer war sehr groß.

Leg deinen Schatten auf die Sonnenuhren,

und auf den Fluren laß die Winde los.

Befiehl den letzten Früchten voll zu sein;

gieb ihnen noch zwei südlichere Tage,

dränge sie zur Vollendung hin und jage

die letzte Süße in den schweren Wein.

Wer jetzt kein Haus hat, baut sich keines mehr.

Wer jetzt allein ist, wird es lange bleiben,

wird wachen, lesen, lange Briefe schreiben

und wird in den Alleen hin und her

unruhig wandern, wenn die Blätter treiben.

• AUDIO: Sven Görtz reads "Herbsttag"
• RECOMMENDED: A bilingual Book of Images, with translations by Edward Snow
• "You must change your life": Rilke's best known poem
• What kind of performer was Rilke?
• An appreciation of the poem by Annette Gendler 
  
• Rilke-Handbuch: an indispensable guide to Rilke's life and work (in German)
  
• VIDEO: A new film about Lou Andreas-Salome and Rilke

Rue Toullier in the 5th arrondissement is a more prosperous street today

"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 --

and 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.

• VIDEO: A new film about Rilke and Lou Andreas-Salome
• Rilke's encounter with Ancient Greece
• What fictional character was based on Rilke?
  
• AUDIO: The urgent music of the Duino Elegies
• AUDIO: Rilke's 'Autumn Day' (Herbsttag)

"God speaks to each of us"

Portrait of Rilke by his brother-in-law, Helmut Westhoff (1901)

God speaks to each of us, even as he makes us,

then leads us out of the dark in silence.

And the words before we begin,

those cloud-strewn words, are these:

Sent beyond the limits of your senses,

go to the edge of your longing:

give Me clothes to wear.

Grow behind things like a fire

so that their spreading shadows

always keep Me covered.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.

Only keep going: no feeling goes too far.

Don’t lose touch with Me.

Near is that land

they call life.

You will know it

by how earnest it seems.

Give me your hand. 

"Gott spricht zu jedem nur, eh er ihn macht"

Rainer Maria Rilke, October 1899

Translated by Frank Beck

This untitled poem, whose first line in German is "Gott spricht zu jedem nur, eh er ihn macht" comes from The Book of Hours (Das Stunden-Buch), published in 1905 by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926). It was written in Berlin, at Villa Waldfrieden, 11 Hundekehlestrasse, in the Schmargendorf district, shortly after an extended visit to Russia with Lou Andreas-Salome.

Rilke is one of the most important German-language poets of the 20th century, and no other modern poet has been more widely translated into English.

• More about The Book of Hours
• Overview of Rilke's poetry from the Poetry Foundation
• Complete text of The Book of Hours in German
• AUDIO: Rilke's encounter with Ancient Greece
• VIDEO: A film about Lou Andreas-Salome and Rilke

Berlin's Schmargendorf as it looked when Rilke lived there

Schmargendorf as it is today

"Prayer to Life" by Lou Andreas-Salomé

Lou von Salomé as a teenager

As truly as I'd love a friend,
I have always loved you, riddling life,
whether I've laughed with you or wept,
whether you have brought me pleasure or strife.

Even in your sorrow I love you,
and, when you scatter me through space,
I will tear myself out of your arms
as a friend from a friend's embrace.

With all my strength I cling to you!
Let all your fire enkindle me.
Even in the heat of battle
let me unravel your mysteries.

Thousands of years to live and to think!
In your arms I long to remain.
And, when you have no more joy to give --
very well -- you still have your pain.

"Lebensgebet," Lou Andreas-Salomé
Translated by Frank Beck

In 1880 Lou von Salomé of St. Petersburg was 19 and studying at the University of Zurich, one of the first universities to accept female students. She audited courses in philosophy, theology and art history. At the same time, she wrote poems, including this bold declaration to accept whatever life might bring her.

Two years later in Rome, Lou struck up a friendship with 37-year-old Friedrich Nietzsche, who liked her poem so much he set it to music. In an 1882 letter to Ida Overbeck, he wrote, "I found no more gifted or reflective spirit. Lou is by far the most intelligent person I have ever become acquainted with." Lou went on to become Rilke's "lover, mother, and muse" and a pioneering psychoanalyst to whom Freud sometimes referred patients.

A 2016 feature film by Cordula Kablitz-Post tells the story of her life. It is available on Vimeo and other streaming platforms and on BluRay/DVD.

In June 2021 Raleigh Whitinger and I published the first English translation of Andreas-Salomé's 1921 novel, Das Haus.

• Lou Andreas-Salome's 1921 novel, Das Haus
• VIDEO: A scene from the film and my review
• A behind-the-scenes look at Cordula Kablitz-Post's film
• VIDEO: Scenes from the Spanish release
• Watch the film on Vimeo
• Salome's poem in German
• Nietzsche's musical setting of the poem
  

The University of Zurich, where Salomé studied in 1880-81