This volume marks the first translation of these prayer-poems into English. Originally written in 1899, Rilke wrote them upon returning to Germany from his first trip to Russia. His experience of the East shaped him profoundly. He found himself entranced by Orthodox churches and monasteries, above all by the icons that seemed to him like flames glowing in dark spaces. He intended these poems as icons of sorts, gestures that could illumine a way for seekers in the darkness. As Rilke here writes, "I love the dark hours of my being, / for they deepen my senses."

This volume marks the first translation of these prayer-poems into English. Originally written in 1899, Rilke wrote them upon returning to Germany from his first trip to Russia. His experience of the East shaped him profoundly. He found himself entranced by Orthodox churches and monasteries, above all by the icons that seemed to him like flames glowing in dark spaces. He intended these poems as icons of sorts, gestures that could illumine a way for seekers in the darkness. As Rilke here writes, "I love the dark hours of my being, for they deepen my senses." Translated by Mark S. Burrows.

A FINALIST FOR THE PEN/WEST TRANSLATION AWARD The 100th Anniversary Edition of a global classic, containing beautiful translations along with the original German text. While visiting Russia in his twenties, Rainer Maria Rilke, one of the twentieth century's greatest poets, was moved by a spirituality he encountered there. Inspired, Rilke returned to Germany and put down on paper what he felt were spontaneously received prayers. Rilke's Book of Hours is the invigorating vision of spiritual practice for the secular world, and a work that seems remarkably prescient today, one hundred years after it was written. Rilke's Book of Hours shares with the reader a new kind of intimacy with God, or the divine—a reciprocal relationship between the divine and the ordinary in which God needs us as much as we need God. Rilke influenced generations of writers with his Letters to a Young Poet, and now Rilke's Book of Hours tells us that our role in the world is to love it and thereby love God into being. These fresh translations rendered by Joanna Macy, a mystic and spiritual teacher, and Anita Barrows, a skilled poet, capture Rilke's spirit as no one has done before.

Drawing from the poetry of generations of esteemed writers Gary Bouchard shows how poems often express the longings of the human heart as a kind of prayer. Emily Dickinson, Rev. Rowan Williams, Pope John Paul II, Christina Rossetti, Robert Frost, and Fr. Kilian McDonnell, OSB, among others, offer readers an inspiring path to reflect upon and pray with poetic verse. Arranged under six engaging themes, each selection uses the words of poets as vehicles to prompt “heaven in ordinary” or to praise like “exalted manna”; to find the right “paraphrase” for your own soul or maybe sense your “soul’s blood”; to muster up from your grief or anger “reversed thunder” or dare to articulate from your own personal anguish “Christ-side-piercing spear.”

A collection of poems by various poets, many with a spiritual orientation.

Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) was an avid letter writer, and more than seven thousand of his letters have survived. The best-known collection today is Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, first published in 1929. Two other letter collections appeared around the same time and gained high acclaim among readers yet are virtually unknown today. They are Letters to a Young Woman (1930) and Letters on God (1933). With this volume, Annemarie S. Kidder makes available to an English-speaking audience two of the earliest collections of Rilke letters published after his death. The thematic collection On God-- here published in English for the first time--contains two letters by Rilke, the first an actual letter written during World War I, in 1915 in Munich, the second a fictional one composed after the war, in 1922 at Muzot, in Switzerland. In these letters, Rilke builds on the mystical view of God conceived of in The Book of Hours, but he moves beyond it, demonstrating a unique vision of God and Christ, the church and religious experience, friendship and death. The collection Letters to a Young Woman comprises nine of Rilke's letters, written to a young admirer, Lisa Heise, over the course of five years, from 1919 to 1924. Though Rilke and Heise never met, Rilke emerges in these letters as the compassionate listener and patient teacher who with level-headed sensitivity affirms and guides the movements of another person's soul.

In a series of letters addressed to God, a young artist considers issues surrounding her faith, probes the challenge of maintaining her creativity, and wonders at the meaning of art and its relationship to a spiritual life.

Ideal for sharing, this Caldecott Medal–winning beloved classic presents an illustrated prayer full of the intimate gentleness for familiar things, the love of friends and family, and the kindly protection of God. Bless this milk and bless this bread Bless this soft and waiting bed Where I presently shall be Wrapped in sweet security Winner of the Caldecott Medal and in print since 1941, this is a prayer for boys and girls all over the world. It carries a universal appeal for all ages and brings to our hearts and minds the deep responsibility of preserving for all times the faith and hopes of little children.

A year of daily meditations and prayers, from many religions and cultures, that together form a beautiful tapestry of comfort and strength. Every man prays in his own language, and there is no language that God does not understand. —Duke Ellington This interfaith book provides insight from various religious and cultural texts and a wide range of writings, touching on our pain and inspiring the healer within each of us. These words remind us of hope and faith, so that we may live a deeper, more meaningful, and fully self-expressed life. During moments that are filled with despair, illness, depression, or spiritual longing, this treasury creates a healing space and draws on the power of wise devotionals for reflection and deep meditation. Embrace physical, emotional, and spiritual transformation through Prayers for Healing, drawing from a select collection of influential spiritual leaders, thinkers, and sacred books, including the Tao Te Ching, the Koran, the Torah, Native American texts, the Bible, Thich Nhat Hanh, Wendell Berry, Jack Kornfield, Rumi, Rainer Maria Rilke, Marian Wright Edelman, Martin Luther King, Jr., Marianne Williamson, and many more. “I hope that people of all faiths as well as those who do not believe in a religion will find inspiration and understanding here that in some way contributes to their own inner peace.” —The Dalai Lama

The ten letters collected here are arguably the most famous and beloved letters of our century. Written when Rainer Maria Rilke was himself still a young man with most of his greatest work before him, they are addressed to a student who had sent Rilke some of his work, asking for advice about becoming a writer. The two never met, but over a period of several years Rilke wrote him these ten letters, which have been enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of readers for what Stephen Mitchell calls the "vibrant and deeply felt experience of life" that informs them.