The Swan

"This clumsy living that moves lumbering
as if in ropes through what is not done,
reminds us of the awkward way the swan walks.

  And to die,
which is the letting go of the ground we stand on
and cling to every day, is like the swan,
when he nervously lets himself down
into the water, which receives him gaily
and which flows joyfully under and after him,
wave after wave, while the swan,
unmoving and marvelously calm,
is pleased to be carried, each moment more fully grown,
more like a king,
further and further on."

Maria Rainer Rilke
(Translated by Robert Bly)

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