Friday, November 4, 2011

After Rilke, The Boy




I want to be like one of those who race
With bolting steeds across the midnight-black air,
With flaming torches like unfastened hair
Aflutter with the stormwind of their chase.
I want to stand in front as on a prow,
Erect and slender like a banner scrolled
Dark but accoutered in a helm of gold,
Which glitters restlessly; aback of me
Ten men, sprung from the same opacity,
In helms unsteadily aglint like mine,
Now clear as glass, now shaded, hoar, and blind.
And one stands next to me and blows us space
Out of a bugle's lips that scream and flare,
And blows back solitude, our thoroughfare,
Through which, as through a speeding dream, we race:
The houses in our wake drop to their knees
There snake and skew towards us street and lane,
The squares that veer away from us we seize,
Our horses pelting on like sheets of rain.

Rilke


Copyright (c) 2011, Israel Galindo