Ranier Maria Rilke

"Since close to death one doesn't see death any more,
just stares ahead, perhaps with big animal gaze.
Lovers, if the other weren't there to
block the view, lovers are near it and wonder...
As if by oversight it's disclosed to them
behind the other...But beyond that
no one gets any further, and the world happens to him again."

Ranier Maria Rilke "The Eighth Duino Elegy" translation from German by Robert kelly