liturgy of the seasons (19)

a weekly translation of Rudolf Steiner’s Seelenkalender verse

IN the 1920s, Rudolf Steiner created a sort of liturgy of the natural and spiritual year in the form of fifty-two short verses. Experience—my own and others—testifies to the powerful effect that a short meditation on the relevant verse throughout the course of the year can have in respect to awakening and sensitizing the soul to each season’s unique quality and gesture.

Below is Dr. Steiner’s original Seelenkalender, or “Calendar of the Soul” verse for this week followed by my translation into English. I have opted to follow, whenever a conflict arose, the spirit over the letter in my translation efforts, attempting to convey the “mood” before the propositional content.

NINETEENTH WEEK OF THE YEAR

19. Geheimnisvoll das Neu-Empfang’ne
Mit der Erinnerung zu umschliessen,
Sei meines Strebens weitrer Sinn:
Er soll erstarkend Eigenkräfte
In meinem Innern wecken
Und werdend mich mir selber geben.

∇∆

NEW-received, in mystery,
thinking spins a history,
from what the senses first surmised
and my soul then inwardized*
and placed in memory’s bower:
let me fortify this power,
and fashion in myself a mirror
to furnish my soul (the seer),
with the chance to see herself. 

thank you to Audrey for the incredible photograph

*Erinnerung, literally “inwardization,” is the German word for “memory.”