The Inner Sky Quotes

“I’ve figured it out, something that was never clear to me before–how all creation transposes itself out of the world deeper and deeper into our inner world, and why birds cast such a spell on this path into us. The bird’s nest is, in effect, an outer womb given by nature; the bird only furnishes it and covers it rather than containing the whole thing inside itself. As a result, birds are the animals whose feelings have a very special, intimate familiarity with the outer world; they know that they share with nature their innermost mystery. That is why the bird sings its songs into the world as though it were singing into it inner self, that’s why we take a birdsong into our own inner selves so easily, it seems to us that we translate it fully, with no remainder, into our feelings; a birdsong can even, for a moment, make the whole world into a sky within us, because we feel that the bird does not distinguish between its heart and the world’s.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke, The Inner Sky: Poems, Notes, Dreams

“This isn't how sickness was in childhood. A postponement. An excuse to grow up.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke, The Inner Sky: Poems, Notes, Dreams

“I come home from the soaring
In which I lost myself.
I was song, and the refrain which is God
Is still roaring in my ears.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke, The Inner Sky: Poems, Notes, Dreams