Ninth Elegy 1977

THE NINTH ELEGY (1977)

1 WHY, when it’s possible to pass away the interval

2 of existence as laurel, a little darker than all

3 other green, with tiny ripples along each

4 leaf’s edge (like a wind’s smile) —: why then

5 human necessity — and, evading destiny,

6 long for destiny? ..,

7 Oh not because happiness exists,

8 that too-hasty advantage of a nearing loss.

9 Not out of curiosity, or for training the heart

10 that would also exist in the laurel ….

11 But because being here is much, and because we apparently

12 are needed by all things here, the fading things that

13 oddly concern us. Us, the most fading of all. One time

14 each thing, just one time. One time and no more. And we also

15 one time. Never again. But having existed

16 this one time, even if only one time:

17 having been earthly seems irrevocable.

18 And so we press on and want to achieve it,

19 want to contain it in our simple hands,

20 in the more overfilled gaze and in the speechless heart.

21 Want to become it. — To whom to give it? At best

22 to keep it all forever . . . Ah, into the other relationship,

23 alas, what does one carry across? Not the gazing

24 learned gradually here, nor any occurrences here. None.

25 Then the pain. Then especially heaviness,

26 then love’s lengthy experience, — then

27 only inexpressible things. But later

28 among the stars, what’s the use: their inexpressibility is better.

29 The wanderer brings after all from the brink of the mountain cliff

30 not a handful of earth (inexpressible to all) into the valley, but rather

31 an acquired word, pure, the yellow and blue

32 gentian. Are we perhaps here in order to express: house,

33 bridge, fountain, gate, pitcher, fruit tree, window; —

34 at the utmost: column, tower . . . . but to express them, please understand,

35 oh to express in such a way as the things themselves never

36 thought to exist so fervently. Is it not the secret cunning

37 of this reticent earth to induce the lovers

38 that every single thing be ecstatic in their emotion?

39 Threshold: what is it to two

40 lovers, that they slightly wear down their own older threshold

41 of the door, they too, after the many before them

42 and before those of the future…lightly.

43 Here is the time of expressible things, here is their homeland.

44 Speak and profess. More than ever

45 the things are falling away that we can experience, for

46 that which, pressing them out, replaces them, is activity without image.

47 Activity under crusts that willingly burst as soon as

48 action grows out from within and forms other borders.

49 Between the hammers withstands

50 our heart, like the tongue

51 between the teeth that still

52 nonetheless continues to praise.

53 Praise to the angel this world, not the inexpressible one, him

54 you cannot impress with glorious things you have felt; in the universe,

55 where he feels more feelingly, you are a newcomer. Therefore, reveal

56 to him simple things, things arranged from generation to generations

56 which live as our own, next to the hand and in the gaze.

58 Express things to him. He will stand more marveling, as you stood

59 by the ropemaker in Rome or by the potter on the Nile .

60 Reveal to him how happy a thing can be, how guiltless and ours,

61 how lamenting sufferance itself purely decides to take shape,

62 serves as a thing, or perishes into a thing — and on the other side,

63 blissfully exudes from a violin. — And these things that live

64 on passing away understand why you celebrate them; ephemeral,

65 they trust that we, the most ephemeral, can save them.

66 Want us to wholly transfigure them within our invisible heart,

67 into — oh endlessly — into us! Whoever we may be in the end.

68 Earth, is it not this that you want: invisibly

69 to arise inside us? — Is it not your dream

70 to be someday invisible? — Earth! Invisible!

71 What, if not transfiguration, is your pressing task?

72 Earth, beloved, I am willing. Oh believe, it needs

73 no more of your springtimes to win me over to you —, one,

74 ah, a single one is already too much for the blood.

75 Nameless, I have decided in favor of you, from far away.

76 You have always been in the right, and your holy inspiration

77 is intimate death.

78 See, I am living. On what? Neither childhood nor future

79 diminish….Overabundant existence

80 springs forth in my heart.