hexum

Already the ripening barberries are red,
and the old asters hardly breathe in their beds.
The man who is not rich now as summer goes
will wait and wait and never be himself.

The man who cannot quietly close his eyes
certain that there is vision after vision
inside, simply waiting until nighttime
to rise all around him in the darkness--
he is an old man, it's all over for him.

Nothing else will come; no more days will open;
and everything that does happen will cheat him--
even you, my God. And you are like a stone
that draws him daily deeper into the depths.
-Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926)