Buddha----Rilke

single

As though he listened. Stillness: something far ...
We hold our breath; our hearing though\'s too dim.
And he is star. And many a mighty star,
beyond our vision, is attending him.

Oh, he is all. Lingering, have we the least
hope that he\'ll notice? Could he ever need?
And if we fell before him here to plead,
he\'d still sit deep and idle as a beast.

For that in him which drags us to his feet
has circled in him for a million years.
He who forgets our hopes and fears
in thoughts from which our thoughts retreat.

And here\'s the complete version of his "anther" that I quoted before (another translation) -

His gaze those bars keep passing is so misted
with tiredness, it can take in nothing more.
He feels as though a thousand bars existed,
and no more world beyond them than before.

Those supply-powerful paddings, turning there
in tiniest of circles, well might be
the dance of forces round a center where
some mighty will stands paralyticly.

Just now and then the pupil\'s noiseless shutter
is lifted. - Then an image will indart (?),
down through the limbs\' intensive stillness flutter,
and end its being in the heart.