A poor bit of translation ...

I was listening to Morton Lauridsen's musical settings of Rilke's Rose poems and decided to take a stab at translating my favorite. I'm sure my version is way off the mark but, perhaps, it does capture some of the quality of Rilke's verse: The French original first, then my effort:


Dirait-on
Abandon entouré d’abandon,
tendresse touchant aux tendresses…
C’est ton intérieur qui sans cesse
se caresse, dirait-on;
se caresse en soi-même,
par son propre reflet éclairé.
Ainsi tu inventes le thème
du Narcisse exaucé.


Wildness surrounded by wildness, Tenderness touching tenderness ...
illuminated by the right reflection, it seems it's your inner self that you constantly caress enabling you to invent the subject Narcissus answered.