Home ⇒ 📌Rainer Maria Rilke ⇒ Exposed On The Cliffs Of The Heart
Exposed On The Cliffs Of The Heart
Exposed on the cliffs of the heart. Look, how tiny down
there,
Look: the last village of words and, higher,
(but how tiny) still one last
Farmhouse of feeling. Can you see it?
Exposed on the cliffs of the heart. Stoneground
Under your hands. Even here, though,
Something can bloom; on a silent cliff-edge
An unknowing plant blooms, singing, into the air.
But the one who knows? Ah, he began to know
And is quiet now, exposed on the cliffs of the heart.
While, with their full awareness,
Many sure-footed mountain animals pass
Or linger. And the great sheltered birds flies, slowly
Circling, around the peak’s pure denial. But
Without a shelter, here on the cliffs of the heart…
(2 votes, average: 3.50 out of 5)
Related poetry:
- High in the air exposed High in the air exposed the slave is hung, To all the birds of heaven, their living food! He groans not, though awaked by that fierce sun New torturers live to drink their parent blood; He groans not, though the gorging vulture tear The quivering fiber. Hither look, O ye Who tore this man from […]...
- X. On Dover Cliffs ON these white cliffs, that calm above the flood Rear their o’er-shadowing heads, and at their feet Scarce hear the surge that has for ages beat, Sure many a lonely wanderer has stood; And, whilst the lifted murmur met his ear, And o’er the distant billows the still Eve Sail’d slow, has thought of all […]...
- Sonnet: At Dover Cliffs, July 20th 1787 On these white cliffs, that calm above the flood Uplift their shadowing heads, and, at their feet, Scarce hear the surge that has for ages beat, Sure many a lonely wanderer has stood; And whilst the lifted murmur met his ear, And o’er the distant billows the still eve Sailed slow, has thought of all […]...
- The Exposed Nest You were forever finding some new play. So when I saw you down on hands and knees I the meadow, busy with the new-cut hay, Trying, I thought, to set it up on end, I went to show you how to make it stay, If that was your idea, against the breeze, And, if you […]...
- In the night In the night Grey heavy clouds muffled the valleys, And the peaks looked toward God alone. “O Master that movest the wind with a finger, Humble, idle, futile peaks are we. Grant that we may run swiftly across the world To huddle in worship at Thy feet.” In the morning A noise of men at […]...
- Many red devils ran from my heart Many red devils ran from my heart And out upon the page, They were so tiny The pen could mash them. And many struggled in the ink. It was strange To write in this red muck Of things from my heart....
- Waves I saw a tiny God Sitting Under a bright blue umbrella That had white tassels And forked ribs of gold. Below him His little world Lay open to the sun. The shadow of His hat Lay upon a city. When he stretched forth His hand A lake became a dark tremble. When he kicked up […]...
- The White Cliffs I I have loved England, dearly and deeply, Since that first morning, shining and pure, The white cliffs of Dover I saw rising steeply Out of the sea that once made her secure. I had no thought then of husband or lover, I was a traveller, the guest of a week; Yet when they pointed […]...
- Cornish Cliffs Those moments, tasted once and never done, Of long surf breaking in the mid-day sun. A far-off blow-hole booming like a gun- The seagulls plane and circle out of sight Below this thirsty, thrift-encrusted height, The veined sea-campion buds burst into white And gorse turns tawny orange, seen beside Pale drifts of primroses cascading wide […]...
- Sonnet 133: Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groan Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groan For that deep wound it gives my friend and me! Is’t not enough to torture me alone, But slave to slavery my sweet’st friend must be? Me from my self thy cruel eye hath taken, And my next self thou harder hast engrossed. Of him, myself, […]...
- Great-Heart Theodore Roosevelt “The interpreter then called for a man-servant of his, one Great-Heart.” Bunyan’s’ Pilgrim’s Process Concerning brave Captains Our age hath made known For all men to honour, One standeth alone, Of whom, o’er both oceans, Both peoples may say: “Our realm is diminished With Great-Heart away.” In purpose unsparing, In action no less, […]...
- Bound Home to Mount Song The limpid river, past its bushes Running slowly as my chariot, Becomes a fellow voyager Returning home with the evening birds. A ruined city-wall overtops an old ferry, Autumn sunset floods the peaks. …Far away, beside Mount Song, I shall close my door and be at peace....
- A poor torn heart a tattered heart A poor torn heart a tattered heart That sat it down to rest Nor noticed that the Ebbing Day Flowed silver to the West Nor noticed Night did soft descend Nor Constellation burn Intent upon the vision Of latitudes unknown. The angels happening that way This dusty heart espied Tenderly took it up from toil […]...
- They Know Not My Heart They know not my heart, who believe there can be One stain of this earth in its feelings for thee; Who think, while I see thee in beauty’s young hour, As pure as the morning’s first dew on the flower, I could harm what I love, as the sun’s wanton ray But smiles on the […]...
- Heart of God O great heart of God, Once vague and lost to me, Why do I throb with your throb to-night, In this land, eternity? O little heart of God, Sweet intruding stranger, You are laughing in my human breast, A Christ-child in a manger. Heart, dear heart of God, Beside you now I kneel, Strong heart […]...
- Vision Of The Archangels, The Slowly up silent peaks, the white edge of the world, Trod four archangels, clear against the unheeding sky, Bearing, with quiet even steps, and great wings furled, A little dingy coffin; where a child must lie, It was so tiny. (Yet, you had fancied, God could never Have bidden a child turn from the spring […]...
- Busy Heart, The Now that we’ve done our best and worst, and parted, I would fill my mind with thoughts that will not rend. (O heart, I do not dare go empty-hearted) I’ll think of Love in books, Love without end; Women with child, content; and old men sleeping; And wet strong ploughlands, scarred for certain grain; And […]...
- Have you got a Brook in your little heart Have you got a Brook in your little heart, Where bashful flowers blow, And blushing birds go down to drink, And shadows tremble so And nobody knows, so still it flows, That any brook is there, And yet your little draught of life Is daily drunken there Why, look out for the little brook in […]...
- On the Cliffs, Newport Tonight a shimmer of gold lies mantled o’er Smooth lovely Ocean. Through the lustrous gloom A savor steals from linden trees in bloom And gardens ranged at many a palace door. Proud walls rise here, and, where the moonbeams pour Their pale enchantment down the dim coast-line, Terrace and lawn, trim hedge and flowering vine, […]...
- This Heart that Flutters Near My Heart This heart that flutters near my heart My hope and all my riches is, Unhappy when we draw apart And happy between kiss and kiss: My hope and all my riches – yes! – And all my happiness. For there, as in some mossy nest The wrens will divers treasures keep, I laid those treasures […]...
- A Dirge “Mein Herz, mein Herz ist traurig Doch lustig leuchtet der Mai” There’s May amid the meadows, There’s May amid the trees; Her May-time note the cuckoo Sends forth upon the breeze. Above the rippling river May swallows skim and dart; November and December Keep watch within my heart. The spring breathes in the breezes, The […]...
- Heart, not so heavy as mine Heart, not so heavy as mine Wending late home As it passed my window Whistled itself a tune A careless snatch a ballad A ditty of the street Yet to my irritated Ear An Anodyne so sweet It was as if a Bobolink Sauntering this way Carolled, and paused, and carolled Then bubbled slow away! […]...
- It's thoughts and just One Heart It’s thoughts and just One Heart And Old Sunshine about Make frugal Ones Content And two or three for Company Upon a Holiday Crowded as Sacrament Books when the Unit Spare the Tenant long eno’ A Picture if it Care Itself a Gallery too rare For needing more Flowers to keep the Eyes from going […]...
- I'm the little "Heart's Ease"! I’m the little “Heart’s Ease”! I don’t care for pouting skies! If the Butterfly delay Can I, therefore, stay away? If the Coward Bumble Bee In his chimney corner stay, I, must resoluter be! Who’ll apologize for me? Dear, Old fashioned, little flower! Eden is old fashioned, too! Birds are antiquated fellows! Heaven does not […]...
- The Heart of Australia When the wars of the world seemed ended, and silent the distant drum, Ten years ago in Australia, I wrote of a war to come: And I pictured Australians fighting as their fathers fought of old For the old things, pride or country, for God or the Devil or gold. And they lounged on the […]...
- The Lover Tells Of The Rose In His Heart All things uncomely and broken, all things worn out and old, The cry of a child by the roadway, the creak of a lumbering cart, The heavy steps of the ploughman, splashing the wintry mould, Are wronging your image that blossoms a rose in the deeps of my heart. The wrong of unshapely things is […]...
- Dawlish Bird-watching colonels on the old sea wall, Down here at Dawlish where the slow trains crawl: Low tide lifting, on a shingle shore, Long-sunk islands from the sea once more: Red cliffs rising where the wet sands run, Gulls reflecting in the sharp spring sun; Pink-washed plaster by a sheltered patch, Ilex shadows upon velvet […]...
- Sonnet 25 – A heavy heart, Beloved, have I borne A heavy heart, Beloved, have I borne From year to year until I saw thy face, And sorrow after sorrow took the place Of all those natural joys as lightly worn As the stringed pearls, each lifted in its turn By a beating heart at dance-time. Hopes apace Were changed to long despairs, till God’s […]...
- The Big Heart “Too many things are occurring for even a big heart to hold.” – From an essay by W. B. Yeats Big heart, Wide as a watermelon, But wise as birth, There is so much abundance In the people I have: Max, Lois, Joe, Louise, Joan, Marie, Dawn, Arlene, Father Dunne, And all in their short […]...
- DEATH OF A POET for Wendy Oliver, who knew him I am the sick animal you dream you are caring for In the long avenues of night I cannot find a name For the sickness except the despair of a poet sensing his veins Silt up like the delta of a neglected river with none of the solace Sidney […]...
- The Twilight of Earth THE WONDER of the world is o’er: The magic from the sea is gone: There is no unimagined shore, No islet yet to venture on. The Sacred Hazels’ blooms are shed, The Nuts of Knowledge harvested. Oh, what is worth this lore of age If time shall never bring us back Our battle with the […]...
- The Debate Between Villon And His Heart Who’s that I hear?-It’s me-Who?-Your heart Hanging on by the thinnest thread I lose all my strength, substance, and fluid When I see you withdrawn this way all alone Like a whipped cur sulking in the corner Is it due to your mad hedonism?- What’s it to you?-I have to suffer for it- Leave me […]...
- My True Love Hath My Heart, And I Have His My true-love hath my heart, and I have his, By just exchange, one for the other giv’n. I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss; There never was a better bargain driv’n. His heart in me keeps me and him in one, My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides; He loves my […]...
- Sonnet 46: Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war How to divide the conquest of thy sight; Mine eye my heart thy picture’s sight would bar, My heart mine eye the freedom of that right, My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie- A closet never pierced with crystal eyes- But the defendant […]...
- Sonnet II: My Heart Was Slain My heart was slain, and none but you and I; Who should I think the murther should commit, Since but yourself there was no creature by, But only I, guiltless of murth’ring it? It slew itself; the verdict on the view Doth quit the dead, and me not accessary. Well, well, I fear it will […]...
- My Heart's In The Highlands Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North, The birth-place of Valour, the country of Worth; Wherever I wander, wherever I rove, The hills of the Highlands for ever I love. My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here; My heart’s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer; A-chasing the wild-deer, and following the […]...
- My Heart and I I. ENOUGH! we’re tired, my heart and I. We sit beside the headstone thus, And wish that name were carved for us. The moss reprints more tenderly The hard types of the mason’s knife, As heaven’s sweet life renews earth’s life With which we’re tired, my heart and I. II. You see we’re tired, my […]...
- Follow Your Heart Although it’s been said many Times before It’s a powerful message, so I’ll Say it once more… Follow your heart, go wherever It may lead, Follow your heart and you’re Sure to succeed! For when you follow your heart And do what you love, God gives you guidance and help From above… And things start […]...
- On the Field of Kulicovo The river stretched. It flows, idly grieves, And washes both banks. In steppe, above light clay of cliffs Rinks mourn in ranks. O Russia! Dear wife! With clearness and pain We see the lengthy way! It sent an arrow of ancient Tartar reign – In breast it lay. The way through steppes and an incessant […]...
- The Flaming Heart O heart, the equal poise of love’s both parts, Big alike with wounds and darts, Live in these conquering leaves; live all the same, And walk through all tongues one triumphant flame; Live here, great heart, and love and die and kill, And bleed and wound, and yield and conquer still. Let this immortal life, […]...