This is the creature there has never been.
Ranier Maria Rilke
they never knew it, and yet, nonetheless,
they loved the way it moved, its suppleness,
its neck, its very gaze, mild and serene.
Not there, because they loved it, it behaved
as though it were. They always left some space.
And in that clear unpeopled space they saved
it lightly reared its head, with a scarce a trace
of not being there. They fed it, not with corn,
but only with the possibility of being. And that
was able to confer such strength,
its brow put forth a horn, One horn Whitely
it stole up to the maid - to be within the silver mirror and in her.
