translation

[fflo]

Herbsttag

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,
drange 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 Blatter treiben.

--Ranier Maria Rilke


Autumn Day

God, it's time. Summer was long.
Cast shadows on the sundials,
and let the winds loose on the fields.

Urge the last fruits to fullness; give them
just two more sun-warmed days
to move to ripen, to squeeze
their final sweetness into heavy wine.

Anyone with no home now
will not be making one.
Anyone who is alone
will live on long alone,
will stay up, read, write long letters,
and wander the streets, up and down,
restless, while the leaves blow.

Comments

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

most excellent, your translation is! i like it a lot. i think it lives well with the deutsch. and it is fun, to keep language alive.

how did you find the poem? did you know it already?

ammmmmbiguity. me like too. quite something.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

i remembered it, but came across it reading poems online last night (instead of ratatouille redux w/you and the boy). i have a book of rilke with the german and english on facing pages. i like that.

americans often say german is an ugly-sounding language, but we're so fulla sh*t about that.

hey, you can see my colors by going to http://fflo.livejournal.com direct, or by looking at this page without the style=mine thing in the url. i sorta like the dusty rose pink in the headings, but i'm ambivalent about whether it works with the other red variant.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

yes, fulla excrement on that most people are, i think. such a misconception, probably fueled by prejudices about the people of the language. and rilke probably disproves them better than most: could hear the music for sure.

i realized i could see the color when i typed in the email window and let it take me to your site. i have a similar red on mine, but slightly less gray. i like how fall-like it is.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

unruhig

good word

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

oh yea.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

it's kinda like "happy" and "unhappy" or "homely" and "unhomely" (canny or uncanny, i guess:). i like that whole set.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

it IS, kinda.

i like that -ig adj ending auf Deutsch, also. the way it sounds. such as i know of it.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

it's kinda strange too that the word for "peace" has two such difficult, hoary sounds in it. sounds counterintuitive. :)

[fflo.livejournal.com]

hoary, unhoary... nah, that doesn't work.