Autumn

    by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926)

The leaves are falling, as if their fall suggests
that distant gardens in the heavens died;
they fall, it seems, in a defiant flight.

And so falls the heavy earth at night
from all the stars down in loneliness.

We all are falling.  This hand here falls.
And look at others--it's in them all.

And still there's Someone, who this endless fall
Within his hands forever gently holds.

                                           --translated by Alexander Shaumyan
 

                   Herbst*

Die Blätter fallen, fallen wie von weit,
als welkten in den Himmeln ferne Gärten;
sie fallen mit verneinender Gebärde.

Und in den Nächten fällt die schwere Erde
aus allen Sternen in die Einsamkeit.

Wir alle fallen.  Diese Hand da fällt.
Und sieh dir andre an: es ist in allen.

Und doch ist Einer, welcher dieses Fallen
unendlich sanft in seinen Händen hält.

                                     --Rainer Maria Rilke
                                           (1875-1926)
 

 
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*NOTE: The fourth line “sie fallen mit verneinender Gebärde” literally means in
German “they (i.e. the leaves) fall with a negating gesture.”  I took the liberty of
interpreting “negating gesture” as a sign of defiance (i.e. the leaves do not really
want to die just yet)--much to the distress of some Rilke “scholar” who gave me
a big lecture about it.  Of course, the leaves could also be telling the reader that
there is no more hope.  But I “defiantly” kept my translation unchanged.