Encircled by her arms as by a shell,
she hears her being murmur,
while forever he endures
the outrage of his too pure image...
...
I am like a flag in the center of open space.
I sense ahead the wind which is coming, and must live
it through.
while the things of the world still do not move:
...
Perhaps it's no more than the fire's reflection
on some piece of gleaming furniture
that the child remembers so much later
like a revelation.
...
World was in the face of the beloved--,
but suddenly it poured out and was gone:
world is outside, world can not be grasped.
...
See how in their veins all becomes spirit:
into each other they mature and grow.
Like axles, their forms tremblingly orbit,
round which it whirls, bewitching and aglow.
...
Some day, if I should ever lose you,
will you be able then to go to sleep
without me softly whispering above you
like night air stirring in the linden tree?
...
The future: time's excuse
to frighten us; too vast
a project, too large a morsel
for the heart's mouth.
...
Losing too is still ours; and even forgetting
still has a shape in the kindgdom of transformation.
When something's let go of, it circles; and though we are
rarely the center
...
You don't survive in me
because of memories;
nor are you mine because
of a lovely longing's strength.
...
God speaks to each of us before we are,
Before he's formed us — then, in cloudy speech,
But only then, he speaks these words to each
...