Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Sobriety: 23 years



Ich komme aus meinen Schwingen heim

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.


Now I am still
and plain:
no more words.

To the others I was like a wind:
I made them shake.
I’d gone very far, as far as the angels,
and high, where light thins into nothing.

But deep in the darkness is God.

Rainier Maria Rilke
Rilke's Book of Hours Love Poems to God


Artwork: Clipart.com paid subscription

7 comments:

Don't Feed The Pixies said...

Posting the first line in German has got me thinking two things: how this would have read untranslated and how long it is since i did my German refresher (8 years!)

A beautiful poem - and very interesting how well it does translate. Happy anniversary and many more. :)

Wayfaring Wanderer said...

And heres to many more.......

j said...

Lydia -- Congratulations on 23 years of sobriety! And what a wonderful poem to mark it.

Roxanne said...

lovely Lydia.
congratulations ... thinking of you!
p.s. I didn't know you were half-finnish .. isn't that funny, and here I was telling you to check out their anthem :)

Lydia said...

Dear Everyone,
I am so sorry that I didn't respond to comments after this post! Honour commented on 10-21, which is why I'm back here now......

DFTP,
My German goes back to high school, and is very "rusty" - very. My friend Francessa (Francessa's Thinking in my blogroll)is helping me in emails. Thanks for your good wishes.

WW,
Thanks so much!

Jennifer,
The poem is wonderful and meaningful in this context. Thanks much!

Honour,
Thanks! It's so weird because when you told me about the anthem in another comment I figured it was because you had read my post in which I mentioned being 1/2 Finn. What a wavelength we share quite often!

Lisa Nanette Allender said...

Congrats on your sobreity! I was just scanning your older posts, and ran across this one. I SO wish a person in my family could get on board the sobreity train, though I realize alcoholism is a serious disease/addiction and is nearly impossible to beat. Good for you, for beating the odds! And I've noticed something else:
I keep discovering that many--so many--of the really great writers and bloggers I adore, are recovering addicts/alcoholics!I think either writers and artists are more likely to be addicted, OR part of the recovery process must include the painful introspection that writers/artists are wont to do.
Either way, I am learning a great deal! Again, God Bless and keep on writing for all of us!

Lydia said...

Lisa,
Thanks for your comments about my S- anniversary. I'll keep your relative in my prayers because there is always hope! As to the alcohol/addiction relationship with writing, yea it appears there's a link, but not late stage addiction too much. And those nights of flash ideas for poems? For me they appear to have truly been sparked by the alcohol, drugs. Not that I was good, but at least inspiration was there that no longer surfaces. Maybe I should try some writing exercises, those particular types of poems that you suggested I try in one of your other comments. I'll have to look for that comment!

ShareThis

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails