I live my life in widening circles

I live in my life in widening circles
by Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. Joanna Macy

I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I’ve been circling for thousands of years
and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?

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I think the first line often about my own life, living into widening circles, and the sense of commitment with the widening, the circling is the work. Rilke is probably the first poet that ever spoke to me, and this archive will be full of his work.

The poem is from Das Stunden-Buch (The Book of Hours), 1905, specifically from the first section, Das Buch vom mönchischen Leben (The Book of Monastic Life). This is early Rilke, written between 1899 and 1903 when he was in his mid-twenties, deeply influenced by his trips to Russia with Lou Andreas-Salomé and his encounter with Russian Orthodox mysticism.