Pietisten

Praise

by Rainer Maria Rilke

O tell us, poet, what you do?
I praise.
But those dark, deadly, devastating ways,
How do you bear them, suffer them?
I praise.
And then the Nameless beyond guess or gaze,
How can you call it, conjure it?
I praise.
And whence your right in every kind of maze,
In every mask, to remain true?
I praise.
And that the mildest and wildest ways
Know you, like star and storm?
Because I praise.