There exists a creature which is perfectly harmless; when it passes before your eyes you scarcely notice it and forget it again immediately. But as soon as it invisibly gets somehow into your ears, it develops there, it hatches, as it were, and cases have been known where it was penetrated even into the brain and has thriven devastatingly in that organ, like those pneumococci in dogs that gain entrance through the nose.This creature is one's neighbor.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on how easily we neglect our neighbors and their concerns, yet they can have a significant impact on us.
Rainer Maria Rilke's quote metaphorically describes neighbors as a subtle yet powerful influence in our lives. Though we may not always recognize their presence or role in our daily existence, our neighbors can affect us deeply, much like an infection that starts unnoticed but grows and impacts our mental or emotional state. The underlying message emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and valuing our relationships with those around us.
In practice
In a discussion about community impact, one might say, 'As Rilke pointed out, our neighbors influence us in ways we often overlook.'
Spring has again returned. _x000D_ _x000D_ The Earth is like a child that knows many poems._x000D_ _x000D_ Many, O so many. For the hardship_x000D_ _x000D_ of such long learning she receives the prize._x000D_ _x000D_ _x000D_ Strict was her teacher. _x000D_ _x000D_ The white in the old man's beard pleases us._x000D_ _x000D_ Now, what to call green, to call blue,_x000D_ _x000D_ we dare to ask: She knows, She knows!
Verses are not, as people think, feelings (those one has early enough) -- they are experiences. For the sake of a verse one must see many cities, men, and things, one must know the animals feel how birds fly, and know the gesture with which the little flowers open in the morning.
a good marriage is that in which each appoints the other guardian of his solitude
He reproduced himself with so much humble objectivity, with the unquestioning, matter of fact interest of a dog who sees himself in a mirror and thinks: there's another dog.
The only journey is the one within.
And now we welcome the new year, full of things that have never been
How many condemnations I have witnessed more criminal than the crime!
We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds... A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men.
Don't you know that everybody's got a Fairyland of their own?
The mere physical man is like the ant crawling on the paper, who observes black lettering and attributes its production to the pen and nothing more.
The intolerance of the few, or the risk of it, carries the day against the wider humanity of the many.
Two or three angels Came near to the earth. They saw a fat church. Little black streams of people Came and went in continually. And the angels were puzzled To know why the people went thus, And why they stayed so long within.
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