Page:Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke (1918).djvu/62

 MAIDENS.I

Others must by a long dark way

Stray to the mystic bards,

Or ask some one who has heard them sing

Or touch the magic chords.

Only the maidens question not

The bridges that lead to Dream;

Their luminous smiles are like strands of pearls

On a silver vase agleam.

The maidens' doors of Life lead out

Where the song of the poet soars,

And out beyond to the great world—

To the world beyond the doors.

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