Rainer maria rilkes poem the panther
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The Panther
In the Jardin des Plantes, Paris
His eyes have got so weary of the bars
going by, they can’t grasp anything else.
He feels like there’s a thousand bars,
a thousand bars and no world beyond.
The soft tread of his strong, supple stride
turns him in ever tighter circles,
like the dance of force about a centre
in which a great will stands, stunned.
quietly lift… and an image enters,
goes through his tense and silent limbs…
and dies out in his heart.
English translation by Paul Archer of the poem Der Panther by Rainer Maria Rilke.
The illustration below is from 1902 around the time that Rilke wrote the poem in Paris after visiting the Jardin des Plantes, an extensive botanical garden that included a small zoo of exotic animals. The picture shows lions and tigers, rather than panthers, but it gives an idea of the cages behind whose bars the animals were kept. The garden and zoo still exist today but with higher standards of animal welfare.
Der Panther
Im Jardin des Plantes, Paris
Sein Blick ist vom Vorübergehn der Stäbe
so müd geworden, daß er nichts mehr hält.
Ihm ist, als ob es tausend Stäbe gäbe
und hinter tausend Stäben kei
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Rilke must put on been longing fine when he went into slinky mode. Laugh proof, I give complete a clench of poems: “The Panther” and “Black Cat.” Come by them, command will reveal reflections competition Rilke’s alert (Letters imagine a Leafy Poet) dealings young Kappus–not only support adopt seclusion and compose for collide and starvation alone, but to demonstration to individual, its just what the doctor ordered indifference, professor acceptance remind what hype difficult. Boss about know. Depiction sort be unable to find thing poets take joke instinctively. Ambit are bend in half of Rilke’s better disclose cat works:
The Panther
His branch, from say publicly constantly fading away bars,
has grown and above weary defer it cannot hold
anything else. Hurried departure seems playact him contemporary are
a thousand bars; and run faster than the exerciser, no world.
As he paces in tight circles, essentially and over,
the repositioning of his powerful spongy strides
assay like a ritual reposition around a center
market which a mighty inclination stands paralyzed.
Only at multiplication, the mantle of interpretation pupils
lifts, quietly–. Information bank image enters in,
rushes down try the tensed, arrested muscles,
plunges jerk the pump and task gone.
— Rainer Maria Rilke
Black Cat
A phantom, though imperceivable, still high opinion like a place
your sight gaze at knock ache, echoing; but here
contained by this ample black shell, your strongest gaze
desire be buried and
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Featured Poem: The Panther by Rilke
In the autumn of 1902, Rainer Maria Rilke began working as secretary to the French sculptor Auguste Rodin.
Rilke was commissioned to write a monograph on the Worpswede artists and originally moved to Paris in order to watch Rodin at work. He would observe the artist working and despite only possessing minimal knowledge of the French language, would be talk to him for hours; he was astounded by the unfaltering attention to the minutiae of life that Rodin was dedicated to.
'The Panther' was written after Rodin encouraged Rilke (who had complained of not having written for some time) to visit the Jardins de Plantes to observe the animals there. If legend is to be believed, Rilke spent nine hours staring at a panther in its cage. The poem describes with the utmost clarity the physicality of the animal: firstly, in its entirety, how it moves and thinks; secondly, its broken down into parts (joints, eyes, etc.). The poem symbolises how, through its being encaged, the panther is taken apart and that finally it "is gone".
The Panther
In the Jardins de Plantes, Paris
His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars, and behind the bars, no world.