German · New Poems: The Other Part

Legende von den drei Lebendigen und den drei Toten

Legend of the Three Living and the Three Dead

19 lines · 17 notes

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1
Three lords had been hawking with falcons
Dreithreedrei · numeraldepends on Herren
HerrenlordsHerr · noun, nominative, masculine, pluraldepends on hatten
hattenhadhaben · auxiliary verb, past, indicative, third-person, pluralmain verb of the sentence
mitwithmit · prepositiondepends on gebeizt
FalkenfalconsFalke · noun, dative, masculine, pluraldepends on mit
gebeizthawkedbeizen · verb, participledepends on hatten
WordTo hunt with hawks beizen is the falconer's verb for hunting with a trained bird of prey. mit Falken gebeizt means 'hunted with falcons'. hatten gebeizt is the past perfect, the auxiliary hatten plus the participle gebeizt, showing the hunt already finished before the scene opens.
2
and were looking forward to the feast.
GrammarLooking forward with auf sich freuen auf means 'to look forward to' something still ahead, unlike sich freuen über, 'to be glad about' something already present. auf takes the accusative here, auf das Gelag, because it points to an event not yet happened. Gelag is a drinking feast.
3
Then the old man took them in hand
WordFixed idiom for taking hold in Beschlag nehmen is a set phrase, 'to seize, take possession of'. Da nahm sie der Greis in Beschlag puts the verb nahm second and the subject der Greis after it, the normal order once a sentence opens with da.
4
and led. The riders halted, legs splayed,
GrammarA verb with no object führen, 'to lead', usually takes an accusative object, but the line ends und führte with none stated. The verb stands alone, meaning 'and led on'. gespreizt is the participle of spreizen, 'to spread apart', describing the riders' splayed legs.
5
before the threefold sarcophagus,
6
which stank up at them three times over,
GrammarSeparable prefix stays fused entgegenstinken joins stinken, 'to stink', with the prefix entgegen, 'toward'. It governs the dative ihnen, 'stink toward them'. Here it stays one word, entgegenstank, because the relative pronoun der sends the verb to the end of its clause.
7
into the mouth, into the nose, into the sight;
WordSeeing used as a noun Sehn is a shortened form of Sehen, the infinitive sehen used as a neuter noun meaning 'the seeing' or 'sight'. ins contracts in plus das. It follows Mund and Nase in the same list, all objects of in.
8
and at once they knew it: there lay, long,
GrammarOld spelling of wussten wußten is the simple past of wissen, 'to know a fact'. The ß reflects spelling before the 1996 reform; current German writes wussten, since the vowel is short. es gleich wissen means 'to know it at once'.
9
three dead men in the midst of decay
WordGoing under as decay Untergang literally means 'a going under', used for a sunset, a shipwreck, or ruin. mitten im Untergang, 'in the midst of going under', applies the word to the three corpses, naming their decay as still in progress rather than finished.
10
and let themselves go, hideously.
GrammarTo let oneself go sich gehen lassen is an idiom meaning 'to let oneself go', to stop holding oneself together. ließen sich gräßlich gehn puts gräßlich, 'hideously', as an adverb modifying the infinitive gehn, which depends on ließen.
11
And all they still had was their hunter's hearing
GrammarOnly still left nur noch means 'only still' or 'nothing but left', marking what remains after everything else is gone. Jägergehör is a compound of Jäger, 'hunter', and Gehör, 'hearing', naming the one sense that stays with them.
12
kept clean behind the chin-strap's ear-flap;
WordAn invented rhyme word Sturmbandlör is not a standard German word. Sturmband is a helmet's chin strap; the ending is bent to rhyme with Gehör in the line before. It names the area of the ear covered by that strap, reinlich meaning 'cleanly'.
13
but then the old man hissed his:
GrammarAdjective used as a noun der Alte takes the adjective alt, 'old', and uses it as a masculine noun, 'the old man', matching der Greis from the first stanza. sein is a possessive, 'his', left standing before the colon that follows on the next line.
14
–They did not pass through the needle's eye
15
and never will go–in.
GrammarSeparable prefix held back hinein, meaning 'in, inward, away from the speaker', is the separable part of hineingehen, 'to go in'. A dash sets it apart from gehen niemals, so it lands after a pause: they never go in.
16
Now there still remained to them their clear sense of touch,
WordTouch named as a noun Getast comes from tasten, 'to feel, to grope', with the Ge- prefix that forms a collective noun, here 'the sense of touch'. blieb ihnen uses the dative ihnen, 'to them', in the construction jemandem bleibt etwas, 'something is left to someone'.
17
which was strong from the hunting, and hot;
GrammarAn infinitive used as a noun Jagen is the infinitive jagen, 'to hunt', used as a neuter noun, 'the hunting'. vom contracts von dem and marks cause, 'strong from the hunting'. das is a relative pronoun referring back to Getast, the subject of war.
18
but a frost had seized it from behind
GrammarTo grip, in the pluperfect fassen means 'to grasp, seize, take hold of'. hatte gefaßt is the past perfect, with the older spelling gefaßt for gefasst. The object das comes before the subject ein Frost, giving 'a frost had seized it from behind'.
19
and drove ice into its sweat.
GrammarDative marking who is affected treiben means 'to drive, force'. The dative ihm marks the thing affected by the action, not the subject: 'drove ice into its sweat'. Eis is the accusative object and Schweiß, 'sweat', follows the preposition in.

The particulars

The text: Neue Gedichte, Rainer Maria Rilke. New Poems: The Other Part.
Reading aloud: Digital narration, directed by 1732 Studios.
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