# Liebeslied · Love Song

Neue Gedichte · Rainer Maria Rilke · New Poems

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/rilke/liebeslied. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/rilke/liebeslied.json. Audio: https://audio.1732studios.com/rilke/<line id>.m4a.

**1** Wie soll ich meine Seele halten, daß  
How shall I hold my soul, so that
> A modal asking what one ought: Wie soll ich...? uses the modal verb sollen, 'shall, am to', not a future tense. It asks what the speaker ought to do: 'how am I to hold my soul'.
> Older spelling of dass: daß is the conjunction meaning 'so that, that', spelled with ß as German wrote it before the modern reform. Today it is written dass. The line ends on this conjunction, so the clause continues straight into the next line.

**2** sie nicht an deine rührt? Wie soll ich sie  
it does not touch against yours? How shall I lift it
> The verb touch against: rühren an, with the dative, means 'to touch lightly against, to brush'. deine here stands for deine Seele, 'your soul'. The line asks whether the speaker's soul will brush against the beloved's simply by being near it.

**3** hinheben über dich zu andern Dingen?  
up over you, to other things?
> A lift directed away: hinheben combines heben, 'to lift', with the particle hin-, marking motion away from here. It means to lift something up and carry it off, in this case the soul, toward andern Dingen, 'other things'.

**4** Ach gerne möcht ich sie bei irgendwas  
Ah, I would gladly lodge it with some
> A wish in the subjunctive: möcht is the subjunctive form of mögen, the ordinary way to say 'I would like'. With gerne, 'gladly', it expresses a wish. The clause it opens continues for several lines before reaching its verb, unterbringen.

**5** Verlorenem im Dunkel unterbringen  
lost thing in the dark, tuck it away
> An adjective used as a noun: Verlorenes is the past participle of verlieren, 'to lose', used here as a noun meaning 'a lost thing'. In the dative after bei it appears as Verlorenem. unterbringen, 'to lodge, to stow away', is the separable verb this whole clause has been building toward.

**6** an einer fremden stillen Stelle, die  
in some strange and silent place, that
> Strange, belonging elsewhere: fremd means 'strange, foreign, unfamiliar, belonging to someone else'. The soul is to be hidden in a place fremd to the beloved so it stays untouched by her. die at the end of the line is a relative pronoun pointing forward to that place.

**7** nicht weiterschwingt, wenn deine Tiefen schwingen.  
does not vibrate on when your depths vibrate.
> Vibrate, and vibrate on: schwingen means 'to swing, to oscillate, to vibrate', the motion of a string. weiterschwingen, 'to keep vibrating', names what the hidden place must not do when deine Tiefen schwingen, 'your depths vibrate'.

**8** Doch alles, was uns anrührt, dich und mich,  
Yet everything that touches us, you and me,
> The turn marked by doch: doch here means 'yet, but'. It marks a turn in the poem, away from the wish to keep the two souls apart. anrührt is the same separable verb as rührt … an earlier, now used plainly of everything that touches both speakers.

**9** nimmt uns zusammen wie ein Bogenstrich,  
gathers us together like a stroke of the bow,
> A single stroke of the bow: der Bogenstrich joins Bogen, 'bow', and Strich, 'stroke', naming one pass of a violin bow across the strings. zusammennehmen means 'to gather together, to take as one'. The two people are drawn together the way a bow draws sound from strings.

**10** der aus zwei Saiten eine Stimme zieht.  
that draws one voice out of two strings.
> Two strings, one voice: die Saite means 'string' of an instrument, not to be confused with die Seite, 'page, side'. die Stimme means 'voice'. The bow zieht eine Stimme aus zwei Saiten, 'draws one voice out of two strings'.

**11** Auf welches Instrument sind wir gespannt?  
Upon what instrument are we strung?
> Stretched taut like a string: spannen means 'to stretch, to string an instrument, to put under tension'. gespannt sein auf can also mean 'to be in suspense about something'. Here it describes the lovers as strings stretched over an instrument neither of them can see.

**12** Und welcher Spieler hat uns in der Hand?  
And what player holds us in his hand?
> The idiom to hold in hand: etwas in der Hand haben is an idiom meaning 'to have something in hand, to hold power over it'. der Spieler means 'the player', the one who plays the instrument. The dative in der Hand names a fixed position, not motion toward it.

**13** O süßes Lied.  
O sweet song.
> Sweet song closes the poem: süß means 'sweet' and das Lied means 'song'. The short exclamation closes the poem without answering the two questions before it, naming instead the sound the two strings make together.

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Source text: public domain (Rainer Maria Rilke, died 1926; Neue Gedichte published 1907 and 1908), from Wikisource. English translation and notes: © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC. Narration: synthesized for this edition.