THE APPLE ORCHARD
Come let us watch the sun go down
and walk in twilight through the orchard’s green.
Does it not seem as if we had for long
collected, saved and harbored within us
old memories? To find releases and seek
new hopes, remembering half-forgotten joys,
mingled with darkness coming from within,
as we randomly voice our thoughts aloud
wandering beneath these harvest-laden trees
reminiscent of Durer woodcuts, branches
which, bent under the fully ripened fruit,
wait patiently, trying to outlast, to
serve another season’s hundred days of toil,
straining, uncomplaining, by not breaking
but succeeding, even though the burden
should at times seem almost past endurance.
Not to falter! Not to be found wanting!
Thus must it be, when willingly you strive
throughout a long and uncomplaining life,
committed to one goal: to give yourself!
And silently to grow and to bear fruit.
-Rainer Maria Rilke
Gladsome Lights 
What a beautiful poem! Thank you for sharing.
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Oh Gretchen, I love those last two lines of Rilke’s poem:
“Thus must it be, when willingly you strive
throughout a long and uncomplaining life,
committed to one goal: to give yourself!
And silently to grow and to bear fruit.
Thank you so much for sharing it with us today. It’s a keeper.
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I just came from reading a different blog where the blogger had posted a picture of her grapevine absolutely loaded with fruit. This poem seemed so perfect to go along with it.
(the blog is called Dorikult if you’re wondering).
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It writes like a prayer and a pleading.
I might repost it as a reminder to myself as to the ‘work’ that God is doing in me to do the work He puts in front of me.
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