Rainer Maria RIlke

Translated by Edward Snow

Stanisław Masłowski Moonrise 1884

Japanese tradition regards cherry blossoms beautiful not despite its transient fragility, but precisely because of it. In an analogous way, what is meaningful arises in the realization of my own mortality, and of the impermanence of this entire dreamlike life: onceness.

—elegus

Rainer Maria RIlke Translated by Edward Snow

Gabriel Fauré Nocturne No. 1 in E-flat minor, Op. 33 Kathryn Stott, piano

Jean Follain Translated by W.S. Merwin

Jan Mankes Lijster tussen bloesem 1912

Rainer Maria Rilke Translated by Ulrich Baer

From Richard Strauss' Vier letzte Lieder, "Im Abendrot" (1948)

Richard Strauss "Im Abendrot," Vier letzte Lieder, TrV 296 Jessye Norman, soprano Gewandhausorchester Leipzig Kurt Masur, conductor

Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by Edward Snow

Anna Akhmatova Translated by Judith Hemschemeyer

Søren Kierkegaard

J.S. Bach Contrapunctus XIV, Die Kunst der Fuge Filippo Gorini, piano

The final page from J.S. Bach's unfinished manuscript of Die Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080 (c. 1740-1746)

Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time: Swann's Way Translated by Lydia Davis