This is an extension of opening the web log to all poetry suggested by reader Patricia A., who offers this translation. We thank her for her contribution.

The Panther

by Rainer Maria Rilke

In the Garden of Plants, Paris

His gaze has from the Passing of the Bars
grown so weary, it can’t behold anything anymore.
To Him, is as if there are a thousand Bars,
and beyond those thousand Bars no World.

The supple gait of powerful soft strides,
turning in the very smallest circle,
is like a dance of strength around a center
in which a great Will stands benumbed.

Only at times the curtain of the pupils
soundlessly slides up –. Then an Image enters,
glides through the limbs’ taut stillness,
dives into the heart and dies.