When Will You Arrive?

There was one night the other week that I had been up till the wee hours of the morning. Trying to figure out what to do to spend my remaining energy, I browsed through my notebooks and reread entries I’ve written over the years. There were the usual journal entries, a short story, unfinished stories, song lyrics I loved, poems and songs I wrote, quotes from my favorite novels and poems, and then there was this poem from Rainer Maria Rilke.

Just a short intro on how I came upon Rilke. I first read one of his poems from our college textbook called Prism.  A few years back, I just suddenly, out of the blue, thought about him while I was searching for poem compilations of great poets. I saw this one, entitled "You Who Never Arrived," and I instantly became a fan.

Maybe it’s because of the weather this past week or maybe because I’ve been listening to Damien Rice of late (especially as he wails “I am lately lonely/ horny”) that I suddenly remembered this poem.

Perhaps because my own search is starting to mirror this poem.

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You Who Never Arrived
  
You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of
the next moment. All the immense
images in me -- the far-off, deeply-felt
landscape, cities, towers, and bridges, and
unsuspected turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods--
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house-- , and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me.
Streets that I chanced upon,--
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and,
startled, gave back my too-sudden image.
Who knows? Perhaps the same
bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, separate, in the evening... 
                                         -Rainer Maria Rilke

A Reply to Your Untitled Poem

I read a poem you wrote

About someone, her lashes, your dreams of her, how you love her.

I read the poem and wished it was for me.

You inferred hearing a song which gave you a tug,

And I remember how we talked about songs,

How we like analyzing lyrics and loathe cheap, pretentious odes.

And I remember the way you’d look at me when you hear your favorite monologue of a song.

You wrote that she looked like a zombie and described her eyes.

It was that description that pulled something within me

Something about those eyes that made me think of mine.

I read that you love all of her but don’t know how to show her,

And that you’d go to the farthest places to dream of her.

You wrote something about how she loved the sky and how that

Makes you believe in something you refuse to see.

And how you’d run from place to place just to see dreams with her in them.

And you’ll go back for her.

I read this poem that you wrote about her

The time you left for some place better.

A place of promise… for fulfilling your dreams.

And I remembered, while reading, how you told me once about a dream you had,

A dream where I was in it.

I don’t remember much but for one detail you said

That in your dream we were both riding on a motorcycle,

You, the driver, while I ride behind you

On some joyride, in someplace within your dreams.

And I can just imagine wearing a white dress with the wind blowing my hair while laughing

With you

I don’t know what made me think of that…

Perhaps it’s the memory of something,

A photograph perhaps

Of your wedding, with your bride,

On a motorcycle.

And all I can do is smile as I write this

As I don’t desire for much…

Only that I wish

That the poem was written for me.