Q:Can you tell me where I can find copies of poems that are read by guests on your show (On Being)? I am thinking, in particular, of a couple of poems by Rilke from the program "A Wild Love for the World" but I do not know where to find them on the website. Thanks, Sarah

Anonymous

Joanna MacyGlad to help, Sarah. Thanks for the question.

Each week’s radio show and podcast have a discrete website associated with it. In the case of Joanna Macy, who reads the Rainer Maria Rilke poems in “A Wild Love for the World” (one of my favorites), you can find them on the main page for this show’s site. If you’re unsure on how to get there, you can find it several ways at OnBeing.org: visit the program archives page or search for the title of the show or the name of the guest. Most often, a poem or a reading or a piece of music you hear in any production can be found on that show’s website.

And, if you’ll indulge me, I’d like to share one of my favorite Rilke poems that Ms. Macy recited in this show, “Onto a Vast Plain” from his Book of Hours:

You are not surprised at the force of the storm—
you have seen it growing.
The trees flee. Their flight
sets the boulevards streaming. And you know:
he whom they flee is the one
you move toward. All your senses
sing him, as you stand at the window.

The weeks stood still in summer.
The trees' blood rose. Now you feel
it wants to sink back
into the source of everything. You thought
you could trust that power
when you plucked the fruit:
now it becomes a riddle again 
and you again a stranger.

Summer was like your house: you know
where each thing stood.
Now you must go out into your heart
as onto a vast plain. Now
the immense loneliness begins.

The days go numb, the wind
sucks the world from your senses like withered leaves.

Through the empty branches the sky remains.
It is what you have.
Be earth now, and evensong.
Be the ground lying under that sky.
Be modest now, like a thing
ripened until it is real,
so that he who began it all
can feel you when he reaches for you.

Hope this helps!

~answered by Trent Gilliss, senior editor

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