Quit Yer Bitchen (Endure)

O ancient curse of poets!
Being sorry for themselves instead of saying,
forever passing judgment on their feelings
instead of shaping them ...

... Instead of sternly transmuting into words those selves of theirs,
as imperturbably cathedral carvers
transpose themselves into the constant stone.
That would have been salvation ...

The big words from those ages, when as yet
happening was visible, are not for us.
Who talks of victory? To endure is all.

-- Ranier Maria Rilke, Collected Works SW i, 654, transl. Leishman