Miss Abyss

"Window Poems," X
by Ranier Maria Rilke
transl. A. Poulin. Jr


It’s because I saw you
leaning out the ultimate
window that I knew
and drank my whole abyss.

Showing me your arms
stretched toward night,
you made what was in
me that escaped you escape
me, since, and run . . .

Was your one gesture
proof of a goodbye so grand
that it turned me into wind
and dropped me in the river?