You, Lady, are the great, high door
that soon shall open wide.
You, most beloved ear to my song
Now I feel: my word is lost
in you as in a wood.
The Angel speaks, Rainer Maria Rilke

Each day in Advent readings are given by various contributors according to the prayer's themes of light, power, joy and laughter and finally of love. The angel speaks by Rainer Maria Rilke is ready by Gus McLeod

Fra Angelico, Annunciation; Gus MacLeod reading The Angel by Rainer Maria Rilke

"Continuing the Annunciation theme, interestingly this poem is from the perspective of the angel. Why I particularly love it is because we are so accustomed to experiencing as human beings something of the likely impact of the annunciation from the point of view of Mary, being confronted by this astonishing apparition in her front room. This poem presents the angel as being awestruck and quite at a loss to know what is happening. It very delightfully reverses the whole scene. It is translated from the German. It's by Rainer Maria Rilke from his sequence of poems about Mary." Gus McLeod

The Angel speaks

You are not closer to God than we

We’re all from Him so far
Yet with such sweet wonder
Your hands blessed are.
So do they ripen, so they shimmer
from the sleeves as by no woman before.
I am the day, I am the dew,
But Thou,
Thou art the Tree.

I'm weary, for the way was long
Forgive me, I forgot
What He, who sits in gold array
as in the sun sent me to say,
You thoughtful one
(great space bewilders me)
You see: I am the beginning
But Thou,
Thou art the Tree.

Wide I spread the arc of my flight
I found myself so strange and far
And now your little house is drowned
in the folds of my great, bright dress.
And yet you’re alone as never before
You don’t see me at all
As if: I’m a breath of wind in the wood
But Thou
Thou art the Tree.

All the angels fear like this
Let one another go:
Never had we such desire
Uncertain yet so great
Perhaps that something happens soon
You only know in dreams
Hail, for thus my soul now sees:
You ready and so ripe.
You, Lady, are the great, high door
that soon shall open wide.
You, most beloved ear to my song
Now I feel: my word is lost
in you as in a wood.

So I came and I fulfilled
A thousand and one dreams
God looked at me; bedazzled me
But Thou
Thou art the Tree.

Rainer Maria Rilke