That from her face of absolute refusal
not one of her great sorrows might fall,
she carries slowly through the tragedies
her features' faded bouquet,
wildly tied and already almost loose;
sometimes a lost smile, like a tuberose,
drops from it wearily and drifts down.
And she goes by with serene indifference,
weary, with the beautiful blind hands
which know that they would never find it,-
and she says fabricated things, in which
fate wavers, contrived, commonplace,
and she gives it her own soul's meaning,
so that it breaks out like something fabulous,
like the screaming of a stone -
and she lets, with high uplifted chin,
all those words drift down again,
going on without them; for not a one
befits that aching reality,
her sole possession,
which, like a footless vessel,
she must hold out high above her fame
and the way each evening goes.
- Rainer Maria Rilke
(Translated by Edward Snow)