The hour is striking so close above me,
so clear and sharp,
that all my senses ring with it.
I feel it now: there’s a power in me
to grasp and give shape to my world.

I know that nothing has ever been real
without my beholding it.
All my becoming has needed me.
My looking ripens things
and they come toward me, to meet and be met
...

–Rilke’s Book of Hours
(translated by Johanna Macy & Anita Barrows)

Then bends down the hour and strikes me...

Then bends down the hour and strikes me
With a clear, metallic blow:
My senses tremble: I feel: I can--
And I grasp the ductile day.

Nothing was yet completed, before I glimpsed it;
Every becoming stood still.
My gaze is ripe, and like a bride
There comes to each one that which he will.

Nothing is too small for me and I love it nonetheless
And paint it on a golden ground and large,
And hold it high, and I don't know for whom
It will set the spirit free...