I dislike zoos.
Prof. Anil Bhatti's lecture on Monday for the orientation course was really on art and science being the two sides of the same coin-the coin of creativity. As he is a professor at the Center for German studies, he used Rilke's poems to illustrate his point. In the handout he gave us was the following poem by Rilke. The translation is by Albert Ernest Flemming.
The Panther
His tired gaze-from passing endless bars-
has turned into a vacant stare which nothing holds.
To him there seem to be a thousand bars,
and out beyond these bars exists no world.
His supple gait, the smoothness of strong strides
that gently turn in ever smaller circles
perform a dance of strength, centered deep within
a will, stunned, but untamed, indomitable.
But sometimes the curtains of his eyelids part.
the pupils of his eyes dilate as images
of past encounters enter while through his limbs
a tension strains in silence
only to cease to be, to die within his heart.
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